2021 release by Stefan Sirbu, in collaboration with Fabio Gouvêa on guitar, Paulo Almeida on drums and Roberto Koch on double-bass.

The story

I wrote a lot of music during 2020-2021. When I met drummer Paolo Almeida and guitarist Fabio Gouvea in Basel right after the end of the third French lockdown, I immediately knew that they were the perfect crew to give shape to some of that music. The decision to leave Strasbourg in fall prompted the rest. The album had to be recorded before the end of summer! We went into the studio at the beginning of August. Roberto Koch joined us on double bass. The album was mixed and mastered at the beginning of September.

I hope that you will appreciate the international character of this production. Both Fabio Gouvêa and Paulo Almeida are acclaimed Brazilian musicians, composers and bandleaders in their own right. Roberto Koch originally comes from Venezuela and has over sixty recordings under his belt. Iranian painter Maryam Ghanbaryan designed the album cover. I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to work together with these inspiring people!

A few words about the compositions. Prologue and Theme features an introduction in which I hear my early influences of the Russian classical orchestral works and a main theme which is clearly a tribute to the work of John Coltrane's classic quartet with McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones. Elsa Au Miroir is a dreamy track inspired by an eponymous poem about love during wartime, written in 1942 by French poet Louis Aragon. Sunset On Mars is a tribute to the times we live in as the space exploration goes further, while the human nature stays the same. I wanted to convey in one piece the excitement of the discovery and the spleen of an imaginary human being contemplating a blue sunset on the red planet; of somebody who has a unique destiny but longs for a return to the Earth. Hope Spot is a hymn to anything that keeps us going and does not let us despair. Vogeltrek is a haunting, minimalistic composition written by Dutch pianist and long-time NYC resident Jorn Swart, who released it in the middle of the pandemic. Deal Or No Deal is a medium-tempo swinging tune with an optimistic, forward-moving feeling. Elegy #2 is a cyclic tune which modulates through several tonalities; its initial spark comes from obsessively listening to Vladimir Horowitz's Moscow concert interpretation of Alexander Scriabin's Etude for piano in C# minor, Op.2 No.1. I composed the title track, Autumn Whispers, during the pre-pandemic autumn of 2019, while Lovid-19 is an attempt to imagine the soundtrack to a pandemic of love.

The music is now out there, at your fingertips, one click away. Although I know that many of you would like to have a physical copy of the records you purchase, I decided to have a digital-only release on Bandcamp, the platform where I supported myself many mentors and peers. You can also get a full digital copy from PayHip. The constraints of relocating to another country were one of the reasons. A digital release also means wasting less natural resources, producing less plastic waste, and keeping the cost of producing as low as possible. In this day and age, Bandcamp is as close as possible to what a modern digital music distribution platform should be. I can only encourage you to become a member of the Bandcamp community, you will be surprised how much of a valuable contribution you will make while discovering and enjoying so much talent in the process.

Enjoy the music!

Stefan Sirbu