Monday, September 26, 2011

Ralph Atkinson - Away On The Wind

Hear The Track Here


Having just reviewed a semi-classical piece from Soundclick stablemate 333maxwell, Ralph Atkinson is just as quick to get his version in. Now there is a conspiracy theory you can really believe in. Ralph, of course, needs no introduction to regular readers, we have long been enamoured with the excellent tracks he has provided for our listening pleasure. His last two tracks, Flashing 12 o' clock (August 2011) and When Love Comes (July 2011), have both scored as high as you can get with me, so he's looking like having a very good year indeed. Anyway, back to the classical bit.

Ralph assures us that Away On The Wind is 'an improvised orchestral piece' which may or may not translate into the classical (as in dead white dudes) style, as much of modern classical music doesn't. Says it does, but it doesn't. Now Ralph has established himself in the quick setting solution I laughingly refer to as my brain as a blues musician above all else, so I wasn't - truth to tell - hoping for very much from this track. All of which points up that I have underestimated (yet again) the things this man can do with music - any music.

Soundclick has more than it's fair share of excellent musicians but Ralph Atkinson must surely be right up there with the best of them, at least in my books. What makes Away On The Wind that much more special is that it isn't, strictly speaking, classical at all. If anything, this is a piece of world music. Nay, an excellent slice of world music, combining sounds from east and west, stitching it all together in a classical format that actually paid attention to the finer details. Such as, for example, the orchestral percussion, an often neglected instrument in a lot of today's versions of classical music. Of course, it IS (yet another) instrumental and you might not listen because of that. Wrong. If nothing else, this is a track that will give your ears a great massage, and surely that's worth a couple of minutes.

Clever classical blend. Highly Recommended.

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