Quiet Songs

Tuned percussion freaks are going to love this. Aisha Duo is the pairing of Andrea Dulbecco and Luca Gusella, who play marimba and vibraphone, respectively. The aptly named Quiet Songs is almost entirely a duet album, with only a little hint of cello and some unobtrusive Irish-style frame drums in the background of a few songs. (Only on the simply lovely bossa nova-style album closer "Amanda" do the guest instruments take more than a decorative role.) Otherwise, Quiet Songs is nothing but pealing tones from the duo's primary instruments. The album was recorded in the center of a 17th century Italian church, and the combination of stone walls and a large, open room gives the album an ambience so thick the listener can almost touch it, amplifying the natural resonance of the woody marimba and the weightless, ethereal sound of the vibraphone, surely one of the most beautiful-sounding instruments in the world. The centerpiece of the album is a reworking of eight of Chick Corea's Children's Songs, his brief piano solos transformed into equally concise but considerably more inviting duets, but the entire record is a delight, lulling and fascinating in equal degree.