Federico Albanese

I’ve got another awesome track premiere and album announcement for you from one of my favorite composers, Federico Albanese, whom I have covered on here before – check out his studio feature and my review of The Blue Hour from 2016. After a trio of successful releases on Neue Meister, the Italian composer and pianist gets signed to the mighty Mercury KX for eleven modern classical pieces making up an album he titled Before And Now Seems Infinite, to be released in February of 2022. Weaving in his beautiful piano playing with electronic and organic arpeggios, atmospheres, and orchestral textures, Albanese creates one of his most mature works to date, one that shimmers and sways in the breeze of our memories, triggering moments of recall which may have been false. Perhaps these words by the French novelist Marcel Proust quoted in the notes are appropriate for the underlying concept: “Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were.” The track I’m premiering for you today, “The Quiet Main” is the first single from the album, and is inspired by Federico’s father. “In appearance perhaps not a quiet man, but he had a reserved side, which I never really understood, nor saw,” says Albanese, “We all have multiple personalities, some on the surface and others buried. My father was like that, or that’s the way my mind decided to remember him. The structure of the piece embodies this idea, with multiple layers, some more melodic, others more obsessive.” It’s a gem of a piece, from a gem of an album, which is something to look forward to from this dazzling composer.