The turmoil that engulfed Ukraine in late 2014 pretty much put a stop to the activities I had been planning with Kiev based vocal duo Astarta (see previous blog posts
here and
here) . We just about managed to release
our album through Comp Music eventually, but any live performances and further recording was put on hold indefinitely.
I am happy to say that, after a pause of about 18 months, I managed to reconnect with the marvellous vocalist Inna Kovtun, and with the addition of Jon Durant, my partner in
Burnt Belief , who also made a lot of fantastic contributions to the Astarta/Edwin album as well as joining us for the live shows we did manage, late 2018 saw us all together for the closing stages of mixing a full new albums worth of material.
As before, the new tracks are built around a set of Slavic folk songs, but extensively reworked and re-imagined by Jon and myself.
Initially working from bare vocals upwards, Inna in turn created fresh vocal arrangements with new harmonies around our newly developed musical backing.
After the mostly remote recording process, Jon, Inna and myself were able to meet up in London for the final mixing sessions on the marvellous
Grand Cru Studios in the picturesque setting of St. Katherine's Dock in London.
We've been lucky enough to also have some rhythmic input from the Twinscapes powerhouse
Roberto Gualdi on drums.
I am really looking forward to releasing the results of our work together, no firm plans yet, but something else to watch out for later in 2019......hopefully before too long...
