Chiara Berardelli is an Italian-Scottish singer-songwriter and this album, her second, was recorded in the artists’ community of the Hidden Lane in Glasgow’s West End.
It is a record which more than justifies her bold decision to leave her job as a doctor to study for a masters degree in song-writing.
This is a true solo album in that she has taken more control of every part of the recording process and it's also a very personal one in that she bravely confronts the sadness of being involuntarily childless.
“I had a deep longing to be a mother but it just didn’t happen” she explains, and adds: “I hope that anyone in my situation may gain comfort from the words expressed and know that others feel the same".
The loss for something she's never had inevitably means that these are songs of isolation and sadness though, crucially, never negativity. Although she laments of having no joy in Deep Space Hibernation, the album’s lead single, she is not seeking pity, just understanding.
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Throughout, Berardelli's voice is warm and tender while her gentle acoustic pop-folk songs frequently come with simple accordion or piano backing.
The 10-track, 30 minute album begins with her "waiting for a place to land" in Free Floating Love and ends with the hope that The Best Is Yet To Come.
In Sanctuary she sings of her gratitude for the support group she joined while in the touching Somewhere New, there's a tentative optimism as she imagines a clearer future beyond the mists of depression.
Chiara Berardelli's website
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