Magic Square by Melaine Dalibert - flau [FLAU99] FLAC download included with physical items

Magic Square

Melaine Dalibert

A 8 track ambient album (25m 41s) — released January 20th 2023 on flau

#electronic #ambient

Movement lies at the heart of Magic Square, French pianist and composer Melaine Dalibert's new suite of piano pieces. Movement in this case is not necessarily physical. In fact, given the history of the world for the past couple of years, movement and travel remain, for many, distant dreams.

The travel exhibited in Magic Square is instead that of a different kind: It is the imagination drifting off whilst looking through a window, past the roofs and telephone wires, to a blue sky studded with distant clouds. Soundtracking our brief lapses in attention to reality, our longings for something unreachable, this is music born of and designed for dreaming.

From the bold tenderness of 'Choral' — five minutes of slow chords richly ringing with pathos — to 'Prélude' and its undulating motif resonating with simplicity, Magic Square is scattered with gentle, soothing music. Balance is achieved with kinetic motion-led pieces, however, such as 'Perpetuum Mobile', which bounces and cavorts full of life, and the pop-like structure of 'Five', while 'A Song', the most melodic piece on Magic Square, is washed with nostalgia.

The album's title itself, referring to the mathematical game of the same name, points to Dalibert's past of using mathematical concepts to create music. Throughout, shards of this logical order and repetition can be heard as much as emotion, for example in the seven-beat cycle of 'Ritornello', sounding like a restless lullaby.

Moving through what Dalibert himself calls a "fantasy journey", the landscape of Magic Square is tinged with melancholy. 'More or Less' clings to the hope of a faraway vision, space between its undecorated melody providing time to think. It's the title track, which closes the suite, that brings listeners back to the real world, as rain streams down the window that was, all too briefly, a portal to another world.

Melaine Dalibert, himself a composer whose works similarly deal in patience and space, is an ideal interpreter « As with his other releases, Dalibert breaks boundaries difficult to define but easy to hear, rendering and dissolving their polarities with a new iteration of his already luminous language. » (Mark Medwin, Dusted Magazine, juillet 2021) of such beguilingly modest music, and this sensitive recording lets every detail resound. - Steve Smith The New-Yorker

compositions by French pianist Melaine Dalibert, is a warm stream of harmonious ripples that echoes the graceful postclassical music of Max Richter, Ólafur Arnalds, Jóhann Jóhannsson, etc, but the economy and precision, combined with Dalibert’s calm hands on the keys, put it on a whole other level of beauty. - Derek Walmsley the WIRE

As with his other releases, Dalibert breaks boundaries difficult to define but easy to hear, rendering and dissolving their polarities with a new iteration of his already luminous language. - Mark Medwin Dusted Magazine

Dalibert is one of the most effortlessly talented and subtlety creative pianists at work today - Roger Batty Musique Machine

Au-delà des genres et au dessus de ce monde, le pianiste français Melaine Dalibert continue d’échafauder une œuvre d’un autre temps, d’un futur à construire avec une musique qui doit autant à Federico Mompou qu’à l’Acousmatique. Night Blossoms, son dernier disque en date (avec la participation de David Sylvian sur deux titres) est une pure merveille ! - Greg Bod Benzine Mag

La musique de Melaine Dalibert, héritière de cinquante ans d’expériences minimalistes, correspond à l’impérieux besoin du public d’aujourd’hui de cultiver un hors-temps et de se plonger au cœur du son. Elle y répond parfaitement - Guillaume Kosmicki Res Musica

Comment des pièces reposant sur des constructions aussi abstraites et rigoureuses peuvent-elles susciter autant d’émotion à l’écoute ? La musique de Melaine Dalibert projette l’auditeur dans un univers où l’assommant temps quotidien n’a plus cours. Plus de mesure, plus de début ni de fin : pour qui accepte de se laisser prendre, Night Blossoms fait perdre tous les repères du commensurable - Guillaume Kosmicki Hémisphère Son

  • Kudos happily ship all items worldwide.
  • Shipping costs and delivery times are available here.
  • UK items are sent tracked as standard at no extra cost.
  • We aim to dispatch orders placed before 2pm on the same day.
  • We are unable to ship orders on weekends or Bank Holidays.
  • If you purchase a pre-order item amongst an order of in-stock releases, we will typically hold your order until all items are in ready to send.
  • Although we use all reasonable means to ensure that your order is delivered within a specified time, we cannot accept any responsibility for late deliveries due to circumstances outside of our control. We will do our best to inform you of any unexpected delay.