Enigma

Enigma is a German musical project founded in 1990 by Romanian-German musician and producer Michael Cretu. Cretu had released several solo records, collaborating with various artists, and produced albums for his then-wife, German pop singer Sandra, before he conceived the idea of a new-age, worldbeat project. He recorded the first Enigma studio album, MCMXC a.D. (1990), with contributions from David Fairstein and Frank Peterson. The album remains Enigma's most successful, helped by the international hit single "Sadeness (Part I)", which sold 12 million units alone. According to Cretu, the inspiration for the project came from his desire to make a kind of music that did not obey "the old rules and habits" and presented a new form of artistic expression with a return to mysticism.

Enigma followed MCMXC a.D. with a series of albums that involved different musicians and producers working with Cretu. The first was The Cross of Changes (1993), which incorporated tribal and ethnic influences and sold over eight million copies worldwide, followed by Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! (1996), which blended the Gregorian chants reminiscent of the first album with the strong intercultural soundscapes present in the second. Enigma's fourth album, The Screen Behind the Mirror (2000), started a slight departure from the previous world music themes towards a heavier electronic atmosphere. This evolution culminated with Voyageur (2003), its fifth and more pop-based album, and A Posteriori (2006), a work inspired by the future collision between the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies, with distinct operatic tones and an electronic spectrum closer to Voyageur than earlier releases. Seven Lives Many Faces (2008) followed and contained a mixture of classical and modern elements, ranging from ethnic chants to rap and dubstep influences. Enigma's eighth album, The Fall of a Rebel Angel, was released in November 2016.

The project has sold over 8.5 million RIAA-certified albums in the US and an estimated 70 million worldwide, with over 100 gold and platinum certifications. It has also received two Grammy Award nominations.