Hania Rani – 'Non Fiction – Piano Concerto in Four Movements'
Stream the album from here.
This is a collection of beautifully recorded and masterfully engineered orchestral works where the clarinet and violins are just as important as the piano and arrangement.
The songs soar, kind of reminding me of how Harold Budd handled arrangements on his masterpiece album Avalon Sutra and also of how Sigur Rós made some tracks on their latest album, Átta.
At times, songs are cinematic, like 'Non Fiction: I.II Animato', where clarinet flourishes and string plucks sound a bit Disney. As does the harp on 'Non Fiction: II.II Presto'.
Some tracks make me think of the wonderful soundtrack to the TV show Devs. The oboe and the glissando strings in 'Non Fiction: III. Misterioso' are examples of this.
I'm also reminded of Vangelis's brilliant faux-soundtrack The City, an album that makes me feel like it starts as a morning walk through a city, both living through city people and by heightening my perception of, well, everything, simply by how beautiful, experimental, and how wonderfully Vangelis crafted the album concept and music.
This is not only orchestral but ambient music. The aforementioned 'Misterioso' serves as an excellent example of what Rani does. She manages to mix the cerebral with the visceral in a grand way. I'll buy this album.