If La Casa Sulla Luna was a love letter to the moon, the third album of the composer and musician Bruno Bavota is a love letter to the sea and to the feeling of love in general. There’s plenty of beautiful piano music to go around these days but the prolific Italian pianist manages to shine and to bring something very unique and really romantic.
The romanticism of the previous releases - Il Pozzo D’Amour (2010) and La Casa Sulla Luna (2013) - is the protagonist of the new album where Bruno expresses his felling in a warmer and definitely contagious way.
The Secret of the Sea, that's perhaps his most focused record to date, is a lovely album centered almost completely around the piano with minimal amounts of additional sonic ornamentation. The tone is romantic and sometimes nostalgic, but never becoming melancholic or sad. At the first listening the songs seem simple and repetitive, but it is their simplicity and repetition that take the center stage and slowly captivate, delight and enchant.
From the opening moments of 'Me and You' to the final seconds of 'Chasing Stars' , The Secret of the Sea displays that is in no short supply of brilliant selections. The evocative power of the minimal melodies is notable and the lush soundscapes created by the warm piano chords is sublime.
'Les nuits blanches', inspired to the namesake and melancholic tale of loneliness by Fyodor Dostoyevsky that the musician loved so much is stunning. The following 'The Man Who Chased The Sea' is maybe the most representative track of the album. It starts with the soft sound of the acoustic guitar and gently builds in a crescendo that lands on the piano passing through warm hand claps on the guitar.
Less than two minutes of pure beauty: this is 'If Only My Heart Were Wide Like The Sea', that is the shortest track of the record but it's where Bruno Bavota achieves the maximum intensity.
The secret of the sea is never indicated but its inspirational power is so damn strong considering the gorgeous poems that compose this record. The only time I felt a melancholic vein is in 'The Boy And The Wale' that kicks off with the sound of the sea waves and it's pure romance.
The album title tune is where the Italian musician changes his style: it's surprisingly dark at the beginning and it's a piece that truly displays the musician’s ability to craft something beautiful out of something tragic.
The production is yet another exceptional aspect. The soft guitar chords, the use of hands on it, the sea sound accompanying the vigorous piano add an incredible layer of immersion to an already absorbing album. Another gem that deserves to be mentioned is 'Plasson', a track inspired to the character Plasson of the Alessandro Baricco’s novel Oceano Mare – Ocean Sea. In the imagination of the writer, Plasson is a painter that tries to reproduce the sea and its waves by using the water from the sea. Meanwhile the canvas of the romantic Plasson remain white, if the eleven movements of The Secret of the Sea would be set on canvas, they would have all the nuances of the rainbow.
The Secret of the Sea is chamber music of great beauty, which will appeal to both classical music lovers and romantic souls.
