The 12 songs on Chiara Civello's debut release for Verve Forecast, Last Quarter Moon, highlights her vocal instrument, her gift for writing poetic lyrics, and an approach to composition that blends her pop sensibility with a reverence for the great Italian and Brazilian composers.
The album's title track, "Last Quarter Moon," speaks to a crossroads in her life, a place of transition and rebirth. "People rarely appeal to the last quarter of the moon," Chiara explains. "It always evokes a crisis in consciousness; there's a struggle between the desire for renewal and the things from the past that stand in the way." The album also features the melancholy "Nature Song," bearing witness to the change of seasons, while the spirited "Ora" ("Now") speaks to living in the moment. Chiara admits that the opening track, "Here is Everything", is "a snapshot of a moment very close to my heart. I love where the song leads. I had lots of fun doing the vocal arrangements at the end; they represent to me the breaking of a new dawn."
Chiara pays homage to the Brazilian influence in her music with "Outono" ("Autumn") by Rosa Passos, a favorite among music aficionados, and an elegant rendition of Suzanne Vega's "Caramel", delivered in Chiara's exquisite Brazilian-influenced vocal style.
The coterie of outstanding session musicians on the album further represent Chiara's musical travels. Producer Russ Titelman brought legendary drummer Steve Gadd, organist and pianist Larry Goldings, cellist Mark Stewart, vocalist Daniel Jobim - grandson of the famous songwriter Antonio Carlos Jobim - on board. Chiara chose Adam Rogers (Michael Brecker's guitarist) and drummer Paulo Braga-"I couldn't sing Brazilian songs without using the drummer that Elis Regina and Milton Nascimento had," she exclaims. Rising talents include saxophonist Miguel Zenon and bassist Ben Street. Mallet, Haddad, guitarist Guilherme Monteiro, drummer Dan Reiser, and bassist Alex Alvear, her co-writer on "Ora," have known her since her days at the prestigious Berklee School of Music in Boston.
"Jazz is the most incredible diving machine when it comes to going really deep into music," says Civello, about her path of discovery, one sure to continue in the future. "But I knew I couldn't be the new Ella Fitzgerald; I couldn't be the new Shirley Horn. I learned all different kinds of music and then I said to myself, 'I need to find my own voice. Time to unlearn now, time to be free.' It's like a hot air balloon: To be able to fly you have to throw off the sandbags. I want to be as light as I can-light as a feather."
