Mexican composer Felipe Pérez Santiago follows his 2013 album, Mantis, with his first release for Navona Records. Formika is an album of chamber music, where the arrangements become not only the thruways to higher and lower planes of intimacy, but their shift in tonality and range brings forth ecstatic energy and texture...

Formika is a classical album that will, no doubt, divide listeners. There's a subtlety and beauty that ripples across these 11 tracks (1 hr, 13 min, 15 sec) but the modern, free-form sounding style may not be to everyone's tastes.

There's a life and energy to the performances here that makes it sound like the musicians are really having fun, whilst testing the range of their playing techniques. It's recordings like this that are hard to not be impressed by.

For a modern, Jazz-infused album of Classical music this hits all the right notes.

8

Darren Rea