Rock band has become Christmas tradition

In 1996, the Trans-Siberian Orchestra created the closest thing to a Christmas music phenomenon that the post-baby-boomer generation has ever seen.

“Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24,” a nearly bombastic reworking of “Carol of the Bells” with symphony, synthesizer and heavy-metal guitar, became a hit and has since become a perennial favorite.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra guitarist Al Pitrelli says that one question is common about the group: “What’s with this Russian rock band with the opera?”

Pitrelli laughs.

The Trans-Siberian Orchestra, which comes to Albuquerque’s Tingley Coliseum Dec. 14, sprang from a collaboration between rock producer Paul O’Neill and the heavy-metal rock band Savatage in 1995.

While Savatage had won fame with several albums and was featured on MTV’s “Headbanger’s Ball,” it was the track “Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24″ on the group’s album “Dead Winter Dead” that gave the group a new career. Pitrelli, a veteran of Megadeth and Alice Cooper’s band, had been asked to join the group by O’Neill.

“This was during the Nirvana era,” says Pitrelli. “Hair metal was dead and buried.”

However, that was only in the United States.

“In November we went to Europe,” says Pitrelli. “When we came back (to the United States, the track), was the No. 1-requested number in the nation - in nearly all formats.”

The president of Atlantic Records suggested that an entire album be built around the single.

“We all got together and just put all the ideas on the table,” says Pitrelli.