Printemps is the new album from Aure (Aure Delaroière) and it’s a gentle delight that perfectly accompanies the turning of the seasons. These are songs that dispel the cold and dark of winter and usher in the optimism and warmth of the sun waking up in spring. Aure’s mix of languages is fluid with descriptive passages in English, the poetic sound of French, and the innate heat from Spanish. Arrangements are subtle and act as the scenery supporting the main players on the stage: Aure’s unforced, beatific voice, and buoyant guitar playing softly rotating underneath.
There is a sense of optimism throughout, and Aure says that it’s “an album of thresholds, written in that in-between space where one chapter ends and another begins”. So, it’s unsurprising that the track called ‘The Beginning’ is right in the middle of the album like a pause to take stock of the past and look to the future with lines like “This not the end, times are changing” and “this is the beginning, my friend everything has been drifting”. There is wonderful use of piano to double the guitar line, and the emotive violin playing from Pauline Denize is exquisite.
The ‘in-between’ theme is continued in ‘The Sailor’s Tales’* which evokes the liminal space between the sea and the sky with evocative lines like “the horizon I’m looking at is a place where I can’t hide, today is like the colour of your eyes” and the allusion that only the sun knows how to navigate the horizon line.
Aure blurs the notion of art and music with the inherent storytelling of her songs (even when you don’t completely understand the language). Her songs conjured up the same emotive power I got from listening to Jacques Brel’s ‘Ne Me Quitte Pas’ or Sandrine Kiberlain’s ‘Vos condoléances’ where the arrangements are sparse and allow voice and melody to reach out and pull you into an embrace. I also thought there was a wonderful symmetry with one of my all-time favourite artists, Sumie.
Printemps sits in the category of albums that can accompany sunrise or sunset, solitude or the company of friends. It can play in the background as you go about your day or, if you give it your full attention, will reward you with depth that can be measured in fathoms. Corentin Ollivier arrangements and production are a wonderful cradle that hold these precious songs delicately and never crowd a voice that is filled with optimistic dreams and fireside smoke.
You can also watch this stripped back and beautiful live session with Aure accompanied by arranger / musician Corentin Ollivier.
Aure: Facebook | Bandcamp | Instagram | YouTube
On the notion of spring I can also recommend Felbm’s gorgeous ambient album winterspring/summerfall which is a beautiful collection of tracks that make music from the changing of the seasons.
* Sailors have many superstitions and there is a great list of nautical folklore here
Review by Paul F Cook
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