The world of music has much more in it than just the hits of today and yesterday. Classical music, for example, has been around a lot longer than the top ten and there are many motivations to be found in history that can evoke the baroque in any listener. One such example would be “Stabat Mater” and, even today, it can be revisited and has been adapted for our times by Electrio.
“Stabat Mater” has a religious theme reflecting, as it has done since the 13th Century, on the suffering of the Virgin Mary during Christ’s crucifixion, and Electrio - Francesco Rista, Simone Giordano and Sandra Lind Porsteinsdóttir – present this contemplation with both elegance and the expected solemnity and, while there are soundscapes much in the style of the ambient genre underpinning the music, it is the delicacy of both guitar and voice that truly sustains the original intent and ensures that the end result reaches much deeper than the surface.
It is perhaps no surprise given Sandra Lind Porsteinsdóttir’s eloquent phrasing that her voice should seem so suited to a work like this and we should also be thankful that, in these days when the art of music seems destined to be replaced by the regurgitations of the machine, that music like this is still being created. “Stabat Mater” is indeed powered by sadness yet your ears will surely find that beauty can be found even in darkest shadows.