Afarin Mansouri — Dancing With Love
Out: October 20th, 2023 on Centrediscs (CD/DL)
Genres: Art Song, Opera, Chamber Music, Iranian/Persian Fusion.
AFARIN MANSOURI | MILAD BAGHERI | THIN EDGE NEW MUSIC COLLECTIVE PADIDEH AHRARNEJAD | ALI MASSOUDI
Dancing With Love, the second album from Toronto-based, Iranian-born composer and vocalist Afarin Mansouri offers a profoundly personal statement on several levels. Each of the disc’s compositions acts as a meditation on an individual form of love, all but the instrumental closing track driven by poetry from mystical and spiritual Persian writers. The intensity of its themes is only underlined by the fact that Mansouri herself serves as the album’s primary vocalist, enlivening her unique writing with her richly hued mezzo soprano voice. This release marks her recorded debut as a singer, and she embodies this lead role with grace and strength, carrying selections from her operas and other compositions alongside members of the acclaimed ensemble Thin Edge New Music Collective, Iranian percussion virtuoso Ali Massoudi, tar expert Padideh Ahrar Nejad, and most notably Milad Bagheri, the highly regarded Iranian pop/traditional singer. The manifold representations of love portrayed here are echoed in the music’s penchant for eclecticism. Mansouri’s compositions deftly juggle rhythmic vitality, languid Romantic-era lyricism, forlorn atmospherics, and nimble melodic writing, producing an unexpected yet generously accessible amalgam.
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