Alessandroni, Alessandro: Il Tempo Dello Spirito LP

Amongst the first bunch of this new label releases, we couldn’t miss a tribute to one of the greatest masters of libraries recordings, Alessandro Alessandroni, born in 1925. In his long career Alessandroni has published lots of soundtracks – and we mean lots of – and for this he’s considered a real star of Italian music. As a friend, and close collaborator of Ennio Morricone, he’s remembered as “the whistle man” for his fundamental contribution to the immortal scores of Sergio Leone’s movies. His class allowed him to range between genres and atmospheres, from beat to avant-garde, from funky to abstract compositions, always reaching and keeping the highest quality. This is immediately clear in “Il Tempo Dello Spirito”, originally published in 1971 for the meritorious Flirt label. It’s an album full of sacred music, gospel and spiritual, yet capable of personal flashes that make it interesting, particular and unique. Simple church songs? In some cases it may seems so – titles as Ave Maria, Gloria In Excelsis Deo, Pellegrinaggio or Messa Solenne do not leave much room for doubt and interpretations – but Alessandroni is able to astonish even in extreme cases like this. The best comes with songs like Il Peccato, Black Hallelujah, Deposizione, Elevazione and Concilio, in a crescendo of mysticism.