Stephan Moccio

Though he is a solo performer in his own right, having released his debut album in 2006, Canadian composer/pianist Stephan Moccio initially established himself as a go-to songwriter for the stars, particularly after "A New Day Has Come," a song he co-wrote for Celine Dion, became a cross-Atlantic smash hit in 2002. The Toronto pianist began playing at age four and went on to study composition and piano performance at the University of Western Ontario. Offered a scholarship to study further at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, he instead chose to pursue his professional career and signed a publishing contract with Sony/ATV Music Publishing at age 22. He ended up composing music for Canadian television shows and a few movies, among other activities. Overall, he spent eight years at Sony/ATV, where he honed his skills as a songwriter, producer, and arranger before leaving the publishing company to start his own, Sing Little Penguin, in 2003 after the blockbuster success of Celine Dion's "A New Day Has Come" (2002). Co-written by Moccio and Aldo Nova, the song became a number two smash in Canada and a Top Ten hit in the United Kingdom. Around this same time, Moccio was credited with writing "What You Never Know," a Sarah Brightman single taken from her Billboard classical crossover chart-topping album Harem (2003). Other notable songwriting credits include, among many others, Randy Bachman's "Our Leaves Are Green Again" (2004), Joshua Payne's "Art of the Heart" (2004), Olivia Newton-John's "Instrument of Peace" (2006), Marc Jordan's "Tears of Hercules" (2006), and Josh Groban's "My Heart Was Home Again" (2007). In 2006 Moccio released his full-length album debut, Exposure, a collection of 22 solo piano originals released by the Universal Music Group subsidiary Bijou Records.