Stephen Bluhm | Out of the Nowhere. Into the Here.
(Independent)
Listening to the new album from Stephen Bluhm is a little like stumbling into the parlor of some early 20thcentury Hudson Valley mansion, where a well-mannered young man is seated at the piano and earnestly entertaining assembled guests with his elegantly enunciated yet subtly whimsical song stylings. The Greene County-based Bluhm’s self-titled 2017 debut was a more synthoriented
affair, but the intimate, intricate chamber pop of his sophomore effort
utilizes strings, brass, and woodwinds—many of them played here by members of the Bard Conservatory Orchestra and The Orchestra Now—to give songs like “The Moon and the Twelve Tones” and “Easter” a genuinely timeless feel. The album’s lovely arrangements, which often recall John Cale’s Paris 1919 or Nick Drake’s Bryter Later, can be heard in even greater detail on the CD’s second disc, which features instrumental versions of all 10 of its tracks with the vocal melodies performed by violin, clarinet, oboe, and hecklephone.
This article appears in June 2024.
