The Great Eliane Elias Carries me into Summer

One of the saddest things about Brexit is that we will have fewer and fewer skilled musicians coming to this country. Whether this applies to EU musicians only, I don’t know, but I am told that it will affect performers world-wide as to whether they feel welcome here, or can navigate their way around the UK’s idiotic visas and silly paperwork. 

I cannot help notice that my favourite jazz pianist, composer and singer – Eliane Elias – visits the UK measurably less than other bits of Europe, and right now I don’t think she is even moving outside the US. Resident in the US and born in Brazil, she brings a magical, mellifluous brilliance to jazz piano. Her technique is perfect. Her compositions are sublime. Listening to her is always a pleasure, and in the summer the Brazilian harmonies seem particularly resonant.

In the extraordinary heat of this summer, the song that is haunting me is  Kissed by Nature. Made in 2002, it’s jazz hymn to the beauty of nature, captured in an album that just takes you to Brazil and back again. At a time when we are so insecure about the environment and the horrors of global warming it is so perfect to be serenaded about the beauty of nature itself…

“Sea and sand and stone, nature’s watching you and I alone; kissed by the sun… touched by the stars…”   

Sentiment apart… this has to be the most sublime of summer sounds… Kissed by Nature

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