The Spot on the Hill blog is about discovery and exploration — discovering new music and exploring the origins and key elements of music I already love. In Now Listening, I explore music that has captured my imagination, both past and present.
Olivia Belli, “Still Blue” (2019)
Olivia Belli’s “Still Blue” is the kind of piece that makes discovering new music such a pleasure. Written for piano, orchestra and electronics, it resides in the zone between ambient and more classically oriented contemporary composition — a richly rewarding space.
“Still Blue” eases the listener in with a gentle opening of strings, woodwinds and electronically processed piano arpeggios proceeding in a slowly paced 5/4 time signature, evoking a freshly fallen snow viewed from inside with a warm cup of coffee. (The piece was released in December 2019 as a “little gift to wish you a Christmas rich of cozy moments.”) It’s a welcoming start to this six-minute track, and just as the piece rounds the two-minute mark, we get a subtle hint of holiday bells.
As the three-minute mark approaches, though, the arpeggios increase in speed and intensity, creating an almost bifurcated listening experience: the strings and orchestral sounds stay at the same slow, gentle pace, but they now co-exist with rapid arpeggios rising and falling above.
The experience is not enough to be disorienting, but it is enough to let you know that you’ve entered a different musical space — the warm cocoon of sound you had been inhabiting has a bit more going on than you might have thought upon entering. It’s that extra something that keeps your ear fully engaged — and that points to pianist Belli, who might be best known for her recordings of music by Max Richter, Philip Glass and Erik Satie, as a composer worth paying attention to in her own right.