Devotion By Dulce Joya

 

Devotion

By

Dulce Joya

Written by

Steve Sheppard

 

The journey into the works of a new artist came upon me in 2017 when I sojourned with the fluent and passionate refrains of Dulce Joya on her debut release Reality of Dreams, now the artist is back with a truly magnificent new album entitled Devotion and what a splendid album it is indeed.

From the very opening piece Joya grabs you by the musical collar and never lets you go, the powerful but utterly impressive Passione Nocturnale starts the proceedings and is in my view one of the best solo piano pieces and performances I have heard for many years, fast paced and filled with a sense of urgency, but so beautifully played.

That aforementioned style is matched so colourfully with one of my personal favourites in the heart felt and deeply moving opus of Yes It is You. The dance with major and minor here was emotive and quite reflective, and mixed the combinations of New Age Piano and a more commercial style incredibly well.

An artist like Dulce Joya has the ability to play light and dark, sunshine and shadow and that can be felt on classy pieces like Forgotten Worlds, her performance here would easily grasp a standing ovation with ease. The more sensitive textures can be also found on tracks like the mood filled opus of My Untamed Soul in Yours, it is indeed an album with something for everyone’s taste.

This is really one of those solo piano journeys you never want to end, the presentations from the artist are all full flowing, and filled with passionate streaming rivers of emotion that Joya is clearly in touch with, like the crafted nuances of From Ancient Time We Meet Again, or the climatic ending composition Mistery Among Candles, an offering that could easily be part of a film soundtrack.

Dulce Joya in my view has created her best work so far with Devotion, and in doing so has raised the bar of professionalism more than just a single notch of the ladder, this in my opinion is the apex of performance and presentation in what is an overcrowded genre of solo piano, but Devotion a classy release of ten quality tracks, is not only an album that stands out from the crowd, it is one that screams and demands to be listened to, and has to be one of the best solo piano albums of the last decade with ease.