Stories By Stephen Wallack

 

Stories

By

Stephen Wallack

Written by

Steve Sheppard

 

Stephen Wallack’s last album Chapters stormed the charts last year and reached the grand spot of number one and deservedly so, this year, a year so difficult to deal with for us all due to the pandemic, has brought its own challenges, but to Wallack this global hiatus has no doubt given the artist much time to be creative, and indeed this new release shows a fine array of very classy and thoughtful musical narratives to enjoy, and collectively called Stories.

The sojourn within the realms of this collection of fine tunes starts with the slow but ever upward energies of the track Sunrise; the artist has it spot on, as we could easily listen to this offering whilst watching the yellow orb rise in the sky.

Rain is a wonderfully energetic track that literally falls down upon us musically with a sparkling reverie and a blissful shower of warm notes to bathe in, the performance here by the artist is truly uplifting and incredibly well played, one indeed has to admire the fluency here of Wallack’s style.

This is an album that has such a beautiful flow to its stream of charming music, and for me it’s always going to be about tracks like this next one that light up my heart, and called Children. The mood and performance is so moving and deeply heartfelt, that it is a pleasure to listen to and be dragged back in time to when things were just so simple or at least they appeared to be.

We now drift into the open arms of a composition called Excelsior, there is a feeling of a colourful grandness about the foundations of this glorious offering, but also one that is carefully created and played, the piano sings a song of a grand past perhaps, and the performance highlights that energy perfectly.

At the midway point of the album we gaze over the tor and look across this horizon of beautiful piano, to come across a track entitled The Dancer, this is one of the most fluent and exciting pieces off the album, one can picture with ease the dancer styling and profiling each and every move, to this quite breath taking opus.

My Love calms the waters and gifts us a moment of peaceful reflection to enjoy, I must admit I thoroughly enjoyed this arrangement, it gained a momentary pause, a delicate hesitancy of breath and time to simply listen to the warm performance and bathe in this anthem like musical narrative, one that in my view is one of the top tracks of the release.

On our next presentation, I allowed the heart felt reverie of Cousins float over my senses and was very glad I did so, the artist has really excelled here, bringing us a moving moment of life’s rich tapestry, the change of pace and tempo highlighted for me the many memories we carry around and can access at any moment, this is one truly amazing performance to be enjoyed from the positivity it was created from.

There was a colourful moodiness about this next track that I really adored, the piece its self was called #8 and whilst I am unaware as to what this refers to, I am aware that there was something quite poignant about this track, that manifested a stylish sense of melancholy about its construction, one that as it moved onward, blossomed into something quite encouraging and anticipative.

I must admit I am a bit of a fan of Monet, I now hope that this track is dedicated to his works of realism and modern art, something I like to create myself. I must admit I was deeply impressed with the melody of this track; the colourful nuances were delightful and perhaps even, the truth of nature!

Our last doorway to this musical realm now known to us as Stories by Stephen Wallack is entitled, and quite appropriately Goodnight, a musical look over the shoulder at life perhaps, and a respectful and maybe even wistful gaze at the journey thus far, in a clever and quite idyllic conclusion to the release.

Stories by Stephen Wallack is another step up the ladder for the musician, in my view it is his best work so far, and one that contains ten incredibly well performed and arranged offerings that draw in the listener, and never lets them go. If you are a fan of the solo piano genre, you really want to have Stories by Stephen Wallack within your collection post haste.