Tania Giannouli: Solo
Rattle Records

Solo, pianist Tania Giannouli's fifth album for Rattle, is the project she's been working towards her whole life, not just professionally but personally too. As a presentation of solo performances, the spotlight, with all of the considerable pressure it entails, is entirely and unrelentingly on her. In featuring twenty-four self-written compositions, Solo also exposes her in the most naked manner possible; never has she presented herself to listeners as vulnerably as she does here. Hailing from Greece, Giannouli's writing often reflects the influence of her country's musical traditions, something particularly noticeable in the intoxicating air of mystery pervading some of the material. There are also moments on Solo that could be mistaken for the writing of another Greek composer of distinction, Eleni Karaindrou—no small compliment.

As is to be expected from a recording featuring so many pieces, the range of moods and styles is abundant. There are lyrical moments but also playful and boisterous ones, and the material veers from jazz to classical to folk without slotting itself solely into one genre only. In being as strong a pianist as she is writer, Giannouli becomes her own best advocate: her command as a player facilitates the writing of material of sophistication and complexity; in turn, the high-level writing requires a performer of advanced technical ability, and she's thoroughly qualified in that regard. Each facet reinforces and strengthens the other, the result a personal expression of high artistic calibre.

Giannouli is no mere dabbler when it comes to prepared piano. Whereas some opt for the novelty effect of an interjecting strum, her pieces show her seriously incorporating the textures a player can generate from the piano's inner strings into a composition's fabric (the haunting “Broken Blossom” and “Gecko” two examples of many). That element functions for her as a key part of her arsenal and not just as a dilettantish indulgence.

Ever-stimulating, the set-list mixes miniatures and longer explorations into a cumulative statement distinguished by audacity and breadth. She challenges the listener immediately by opening with “Transportal,” a brooding, enigmatic rumination whose percussive patterns evoke the chiming dazzle dulcimers are capable of producing. Another long-form expression follows, this one, “Novelette,” sunnier by comparison and an example of her lyrical side. Not that she's ever derivative, but her playing in this instance is as engaged as Keith Jarrett's would be in one of his own probing examinations. Traces of Greek folk music seep into the entrancing lilt of “Intone” before the piece exchanges lyricism for an insistent rhythm-driven attack. Whereas “Two Notes” uses an oscillating see-saw figure as a springboard, “Demagnitude” uses a clangorous, somewhat gamelan-like ground as a foundation for improvising. In contrast to the pensive meditation “Grey Blue” and introspective “Same Dream,” “Spiral” drives with an almost jazz-like fury. A particularly lovely expression, “Unfailing Stars,” ends the project in stirring fashion.

August 2023