ARADÌA

Sophya Baccini is an Italian artist from Naples. After many albums as a singer of a band called Presence, in 2009 she released her first solo album, "Aradia", for Black Widow Records. The album was recorded with the help of some collaborators like Vittorio Cataldi (violin, accordion), Franco Ponzo (guitars) and Pino Falgiano (keyboards). Some guest musicians contributed to enrich the sound like, among others, Martin Grice (Delirium), Lino Vairetti (Osanna) and Stefano Vicarelli (Fonderia). Sophya Baccini composed the music, wrote the lyrics, played piano and synthesizers and sung...

This work features a long suite in 13 parts, three other tracks and a Joni Mithcell's cover, "Circle game". The suite is a kind of musical and spiritual path describing the friendship between two women, Aradia and Elide, and its importance for the way of life and the full self realisation of the protagonist Aradia. Lyrics are hermetic to say the least, in part written in Italian, in part in English and in part in French... This doesn't help to comprehend the "concept" and there are no liner notes to explain it on the booklet. The music is extremely heterogeneous with influences ranging from jazz to classical, from Piazzolla to Jethro Tull, but the thread that keeps the single parts of the suite together is very thin and the blending is not completely convincing. Some passages are absolutely brilliant, like the charming overture "La pietra", the unquiet and dreamy "Dont' Dream That Dream" or the melodic and sumptuous "Elide". Other parts in my opinion are less satisfactory like "Ever Too Small" that seems coming out from an album of Diana Krall or the melodramatic duet with Lino Vairetti "Non è l'amore il tuo destino".

This album contains many good moments, but in my opinion it's like if some parts were put in the wrong place... The voice of Sophya is beautiful, powerful and melodic, but listeners have to jump from one thing to another and, at length, even the outstanding tracks are in some way diluted by the excess of different musical ideas and risk to lose their charm.

On the whole I consider "Aradia" a good album, but not an essential one in a prog collection. I'm sure that such a sensitive and gifted artist can do better...