Symphony Infinitum By Phillip Kanakis

 

Symphony Infinitum

By

Phillip Kanakis

Written by

Steve Sheppard

 

The soft pastiche of a piano based album with a plethora of added instrumentation came my way today in the guise of Symphony Infinitum by Phillip Kanakis. This wondrous moment of sonic exploration filled the start of my day with hope and cheer, as we wend our way through a personal 30 year journey for the artist, and a work that contains the mastery of The City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir as well.

The album itself is a 10 track opus of grandeur, a powerful and moving collection of touching works, like the opening offering entitled Symphony Infinitum Intro. The steady onward procession of this piece is most appealing; it establishes the scale and atmosphere: something expansive, timeless and almost cosmic.

Short form narratives are here as well including the following piece called Epic Journey. This informative musical tale explains the weave of the theme as we possibly begin leaving the familiar, encountering challenges, and pursuing something larger, elements of Philip Glass can be found within the weave of this manifestation. Then onto the thoughtful musical prose of Reflection, the accompanying percussion and drums were particularly effective here, in a track that when meshed with the strings, was a real team effort, and a classy cinematic opus in structure.

Sweet Moments is a soft and tender tonal delight and certainly the most intimate offering thus far. There is a focused shift toward simple experiences that make life meaningful and simple; this is followed though by the powerful and rock styled ethic of Seven Rings, the full flowing choir here was truly inspiring to listen to, and brought chills to the arms and neck, the electric guitar also in its War of the Worlds Style was enticing; this would turn out to be one of my personal favourites from the entire release.

The midway juncture is reached, and with a classical tradition, drawing on Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. But rather than simply presenting Beethoven's work, the title "Essence of Moonlight" suggests extracting its emotional core, and in doing so, placing it inside Kanakis's broader cinematic-orchestral universe.

108 Overture is a wonderfully uplifting composition that I personally found quite chilled, and containing an almost drifting narrative. Until I researched I must admit to not knowing this, which the number 108 carries significant symbolic importance’s in several Eastern spiritual traditions. Here the artist manifests something deeply personal, but the tone of the aforementioned creation is anthem like in its energies.

When we reach the more cinematic opus of Infinity we are gifted a real treat, a flowing classical arrangement with piano that reminds me of the works of Michael Hoppe. After the journey, reflection and spiritual symbolism, the music arrives at something much larger than the individual, this is a grand sweeping gesture of a creation that is much appreciated.

The penultimate offering is entitled For What Words Cannot Say, to me Kanakis is in his element on this offering, a constant piano progression and narration can be found here that is utterly incredibly and thoroughly enjoyable, there is a depth here that is also palpable, as if it is bringing the enormous cosmic ideas back to something deeply human, in its musical cycle.

The concluding arrangement is Hymn to the World, if ever you wanted to go out with something amazingly powerful this would be the very track I would point to, its majesty and grace would finish any movie perfectly.

Symphony Infinitum by Phillip Kanakis is a classy collection of creative choices and compositions, perhaps in summing up it would be wise to think of this album as a whole entity, rather than individual tracks, and that the experience could very well be a cinematic meditation on existence. Regardless this is a stunning release and, and it should do incredibly well in the charts for Symphony Infinitum by Phillip Kanakis.