Latin Jazz from Fabio Gianni

Jazz and Latin music – both passionate and rhythmic but in a slightly different way. I believe that this simultaneous similarity-and-different makes them so good in a combination. I personally love mixed forms of art, especially when it comes to music. And that’s why coming across some new artists who can do it skillfully is every time a little treasure to me. My latest finding is of Italian origin – pianist, composer and arranger Fabio Gianni. It’s one of those cases when you are not too likely to meet the musician’s work at every corner of the Internet, because Fabio doesn’t seem to be too crazy about online promotion preferring real-life word-spread to it (at least I got such an impression trying to find some more info about him in the world network – too scarce).

Fabio began to play salsa music about 15 years ago and apparently loved it so much that decided to make it his passion. That’s how the idea of the “Latin Sound Machine” project was born, where the Latin was mixed up with some pop, jazz, soul and a bit of rock. The Italian pianist stuck to that direction and was composer for different bands playing Latin music, like “IGUAZU” trio. He also made salsa-jazzy duets with popular musicians like Cano Estremera, Tony Vega, Maelo Ruiz, Paquito Guzman and others, as well as creating a long list of own solo works for piano.

The first composition I heard was “Tell You How I'm Feeling” and I recommend it for your first listen too. Just lovely. And there’s the music score to it, for piano, if you wanna play it yourself. Oh, and sheet music to some other works by Gianni - here. If you like salsa as much as I do – enjoy!

If Claude Debussy painted on canvas

He would of course be an impressionist. However, Debussy himself strongly disliked being called an impressionist composer. Despite that, impressionism is the first thing that may come to mind when you are listening to, say, “Reverie”. No need to say that Claude Debussy is the prominent master of creating dreamy music for piano, taking inspiration from then-popular movement symbolism.

Madame Monet and Child,  Claude Monet

Indeed, when the piece is playing, you are gradually descending into the calm world of daydreaming, and the repetitive sounds in the first part make you delve into it even deeper. “Reverie” is one of the earliest works by Debussy – composed in 1890 – that’s the time when he was still trying to decide which way to take as far as composing style. No recognizable tricks like explosions in style and texture yet, just lovely meditation music. As it turned out later, Reverie is also among the first works that had a tangible impact on the musicians’ world and earned its author a sign of impressive potential.

Here’s an ‘impressionist video’of Reverie and the score of arrangement for string quintet. Enjoy!