tesseract's Full Review: Aria Vol. 2 by Cafe Del Mar
I first discovered Cafe del Mar's Aria 2: New Horizon while listening to internet radio at work. I normally put on something very light at low volume, just enough to provide an almost white noise level of background music that’s soothing without being at all distracting, so I wasn’t expecting to hear anything that would grab my attention. To my surprise, I found myself struck dumb, listening to something on the “Easy Classical” station that was definitely NOT Vivaldi. It seemed to be some sort of opera aria, but like none I’d ever heard before. A crystalline, angelic soprano soared along with a haunting piccolo line, backed by strings over… a pop beat. Wha…?? If you recall Enya’s pop remix of her "Only Time" single that got so much airplay a few years ago, it was kind of like that, only where Enya’s vocals float like a wisp of silk drifting in a light breeze, this voice soared like an eagle, purposeful and piercing.
I sat transfixed while the song played out, and barely gathered my wits in time to check the artist and track information before it disappeared. Unfortunately, all I got was “Various Artists – Ebben,” and it took a fair amount of internet sleuthing to find the song. I discovered fairly quickly that “Ebben? Ne Andro Lontano,” is a fairly well-known aria from Catalini’s opera La Wally, but no collection of classic opera arias contained anything like this. I finally tracked down the Cafe del Mar album Aria 2: New Horizon, but I had to go to Russia to get a sample clip so I could verify it contained the song I had heard. (OK, so it was just a Russian website.)
Cafe del Mar is both a well-known hangout in Ibiza, Spain that’s billed as one of the world’s most romantic spots to watch the sunset and the series of CDs that’s billed as the Cafe’s official “Soundtrack to Sunset.” The Cafe del Mar series is currently on Volume 13 and still going strong, but since then the Cafe del Mar name has branched out into other projects, including the Dream series, the Chill House series, and the Aria series, each with its own personality. The Aria series, currently three volumes strong, combines new age, ambient, electronica, classical, opera, and a bit of pop. The result is a little like cotton candy—a light, airy confection with no real nutritional value, but boy, is it a treat! It’s relaxing without being melancholy, it mostly has enough pep to keep it from being sleep-inducing, and it’s sort-of opera without all the exhausting coloratura. I was never a big fan of operatic singing for that very reason, so I think it’s a big improvement on the real thing.
It turns out that angelic sound I’d heard is the voice of Rebecca Luker (I think this is the correct credit, but I can’t confirm it). While her voice doesn’t have the depth or personality of the “great” singers, there’s no question she’s very pleasant to listen to. Her singing is clean and clear, without extra ornamentation, just the way I like it. She features on nearly every track, and that’s a great thing. Many of the tracks are overt homages to well-known pieces of classical music, including Monteverdi's "Lament of Arianna," Verdi's "Addio" from La Traviata, Faure's "Pavane," and Schubert's "Leiermann" from Die Wintereise, while others are completely original compositions.
"Ebben," the track that got me here, is the most powerful and outstanding piece on the album. The next best offering is a spunky version of Caccini's "Ave Maria" where the main vocals are backed by a male chorus and a trance beat, and if you didn’t think "Ave Maria" could get spunky, just wait! "Barcarolle" was almost there, but right when I thought it was going to explode into greatness it just-- stopped. Most of the other tracks aren’t distinctly memorable, but are nice to listen to. I would say the disc as a whole makes good mood or background music, except that it tends to go from quiet to loud fairly often.
A few of the tracks are more Enya, while many others are more Bond, but if you like either, I think you’ll enjoy the Aria series. It might even be fair to describe it as “Bond featuring voice instead of violin.” Another reviewer demeaned it by calling it “popera,” and I think it’s pretty apt, but I know what I hate, and I don’t hate popera. In fact, I think I’ll have some more popera. Yummy!
I give it 3.5 stars, so I’m rounding up to 4, in the spirit of generosity.
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