Elisabeth Cutler - Slow Release [CD]

Boston baked and bred, Seattle coffee-housed; Sante Fe escapee become Nashville-worn down-and -outsider turned European ex-patriot; evocative artist Elisabeth Cutler resurfaces in splendor with her fifth CD album of gorgeous and intimate songs, aptly entitled, Slow Release. A musically evolved and lyrically dense accomplishment, this new collection of songs is rich in nuance and scents of the Orient, that add to Elisabeth's universal style, which already includes the distinctive qualities of West Coast melodies and psychedelic sounds combined with the harmonic progression and structure of improvisational jazz. Built on the stable foundation of her confident guitar style and sound writing, Slow Release, showcases a new dimension of Elisabeth's vocal performance: refined, and superb in phrasing and breath, she has discovered confidence with her simple, direct and pure approach. Without doubt, a year of intensive study with Francesca Cassio, composer, ethno-musicologist, singer and scholar of Indian music, opened a new perspective in singing for Elisabeth; a more mature Elisabeth relaxes into the music and is more connected with her voice than ever before. Distilled from her European years, Slow Release, produced by Filippo De Laura and recorded by Eugenio Vatta in Rome, Italy, is a lyrically dense, adventurous and musically experimental work, about the rebirth of a woman and artist in a new world. "After five albums," affirms Elisabeth, "I now understand that the creation of a new work is the closest experience to motherhood. In this final phase of release, as I watch my new creation, so sparkling, tender and terribly vulnerable, which must now be exposed to the judgment of the world, I tell myself, I have done the best I am able to at this time. All I ask, is to give it a good, close listen, and a chance to be loved, as I have loved creating it." One must let go. It is, indeed, a Slow Release.