Val Giamo- Stay With Me For Thirty Minutes
Reviewed Dy Duzzy Clayton
Doing what I do I get sent a lot of music to either play on my radio show or to do a review such as this one, and every time I am amazed and feel blessed just by what great music I get to hear and then share with the world. And ladies and gentlemen once again I have come across a musician who is so talented and so passionate about what she does that it shows in her music, I am talking about none other than Val Giamo who is based in Sweden
Val has just come out with a piano cello album called Stay With Me For Thirty Minutes, this unique instrumental album is a masterpiece that boasts 11 tracks that take you on a journey from start to finish, each song is equipped with its own story and each note is played you are taken on a journey of either a of sense calmness or dramatic music that has you touched to your very core.
Track 1, Let Us Find a Place is exactly that which I describe in the latter, I feel, when I listen to that track, The Bass Piano playing takes me on a sense of dramatic feeling that immediately makes me want to listen closer, always a good sign for a first song opener
Track 2, namely called An Abandoned House, I thought would be a very scary number if its title track was anything to go by, but I was instead met with a fast piano playing that kind of put me in a playful mood, and I am not at all being the one to interoperate the music I am hearing but if I was to give my verdict on what the song is about, maybe the abandoned house is less of being scary but a house to explore and to feel comfort to while doing so, once again this is my interpretation of the song and I urge you to listen closely and make your mind up on what you feeling when listening to it
Track 3, also titled Something to do with House or Home is called Far Away From Home, and this track is a calm piece of piano playing music but also kind of puts a bit of a lump in my throat, its amazing how music can do that, A song can have no words or lyrics but can still say so much and make you feel so much emotion and this track gives me that exact feeling, a similar feeling I got when I listened to Pink Floyd’s track called A Great Gig In The Sky, Val has managed to make me feel those emotions just by her beautiful piano playing
Track 4, out of 11 songs and I feel I have already been put on a roller coaster of songs and emotions, this album if anything is a very powerful album with amazing pieces of music
As I start to listen to track 4 namely, We Are Two Rivers Joined, I decide to make coffee as the track plays on my loudspeakers, I will be honest I was expecting soft piano playing but instead I was approached with a Cello playing, the album seems to have taken a turn, and If I may say a turn for the better. I would like to say the track placement on the album was placed perfectly and was a great change from the piano playing we have been listening to before. The Cello playing can be credited to Axel Vilborg who seems to be a great musician who fits in well with Val’s music and vision.
I decided to stop writing a bit and just take in this great piece of music, I am a grunge, rock, and metal fan, I always knew I liked a bit of classical music but something about these songs and particularly this cello-playing track loves me and I do need to take a second just to take it all in, track 4 is a lead single off the album in my opinion
As I move on to track 5, namely, Words Are Gone As Waves, I am just about halfway through the album and I am already so moved with each track, I think I should make mention of these song titles, not only is the music beautiful and deep but so is the song titles. I can see a lot of work has been put into this album from the music to even the titles, Words Are Gone As Waves is yet another calmer, smoother-sounding piano track, when I listen to this track I am taken over by some calm and enjoyment feelings
One thing is for sure, this album is defiantly an album I can fall asleep to, I am one of those people who need background noise to help me asleep, whether it be binaural beats or the sound of rain or now my new favorite piece of music Val Giamo’s new album
Back to listening to the album, I have made it to track 6, namely, Look At Me, A once again dramatic piece of piano that once again is played to perfection and I am once again taken on a journey, it is not up to me to interpret what the song is about, but in my mind I am taken to a relationship with a significant other where I am not being heard and being ignored and I want my spouse to just look at me, and see the pain I’m feeling, once again this is just my interpretation on what the song does for me and I do urge you to make your mind up on what you feel when you hear this piece of music
On to Track 7 now namely, Cold Hand but a Warm Embrace, once again a strong title and also once again a track that starts with piano but is met with beautiful cello playing, This music is just so peaceful and an amazing piece of art.
I move on to track 8 and as I pour myself another cup of coffee, my wife has now come home and instead of telling me to turn the music down, she is saying this is beautiful music, I begin to tell her all about this new musician I have come across and made aware of, Val Giamo from Sweden, she can see I am quite excited and leaves me to do my review while track 8 namely Against The Silence is playing throughout the house. Once again a beautiful but dramatic piece of music, just like its song title, this is one of those piano tracks that just seem to hit all the right notes to put me in a sense of calmness.
Moving on to track 9 I know I am almost at the end of the album, which kind of makes me sad but I am hit with o0nce a beautiful piece of music in a track called A Picture Of You, and while listening to this track, I kind of feel happy, the great piano playing and sounds kind of puts me in a good mood.
Moving on to track 10, called I Remember to Forget, I am once again feeling a bit of sadness, I don’t know if it is because I am reaching the end of the album or maybe the certain notes being played kind of pull at my heartstrings but I do once again lump in my throat, somehow the music making me feel some sort of emotions and all this is being done with no lyrics and just piano playing alone, AMAZING
Track 11, namely called Three Minutes Left, is quite fitting because that track is just over 3 minutes long, I must say everything and its placing on where it should go on the album is perfectly done and I could not think of a better track to end the off the album, once again a very bass orientated dramatic piece of music and whilst I type this review my fingers are moving in sync of the notes I am hearing, but I can only dream to play the piano as well and beautiful as Val does
I would like to congratulate Val and everyone who worked on this beautiful album, this is truly a great piece of music that can turn even a metalhead like myself to tears with both happy feelings.
Interesting Facts About Val Giamo
Val Giamo is a composer, singer, and music producer currently living in Gothenburg, Sweden.
From 2013 to 2017 Val Giamo worked as a composer, arranger, pianist, and singer, helping with a wide variety of musical projects, as well as working with many styles of music groups and bands.
In 2018, Val moved to Sweden and devoted the entire year to writing piano music. In early 2019, she released the album Fragments. The album contains ten fragments, played by piano and cello, designed to reflect different seasons and moods, reminding one of mint or burgundy.
Val Giamo continued to focus on her music. She began to collaborate with fashion designer Sareh Nouri from New York. She wrote the delicate composition Yesterday Waltz for a film about Sareh’s new collection of wedding dresses (directed by Rodin Hamidi).
In 2019, Val wrote the composition Flying Above The Winds for the compilation of Project 12 by the label Deutsche Grammophon / Universal Music Group. Click HERE
In 2020, Val Giamo released singles Fragment Ash (Extended Version), Fragment Porcelain (Extended Version), and the piano/cello album People You Will Never Meet, inspired by one of her favorite films, Wings of Desire. Click HERE
In August 2021 a single Meduza was released.
In Autumn 2023 the singles If It Is Me, What Should I Say, How Seldom We Speak, You Are The Same But Further From Home were released.
A piano cello album Stay With Me For Thirty Minutes was released on December 29, 2023.
Val Giamo & Guest Mode’s album Make It Darker is coming this month
Val Giamo also provided the music for commercial films.
Val Giamo was introduced to music at an early age. She began playing the piano at the age of five. She was educated, both academically and in classical music, at the Russian Music School n.a. P.I. Tchaikovsky. From 2009 to 2013 Val took private lessons from Y.N. Chugunov, and G.E. Minsker in Piano, Harmony and Theory of Music. In 2013, she attended the online Music Production course at the Berklee College of Music.
Diverse education and experience in completely different genres from trip hop to piano music help Val Giamo to create compositions that are completely personal and, at the same time, understandable and moving for each listener.
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