The combined tracks for "The Death Of A Star" flow together seamlessly. Each has it's own feeling, which is good. So many flow on and on, and one can not tell if one song has ended or not! "Passion Passing" is an outstanding tune, and one can see why it was added to the compilation for 'WolfSong's'. Beautiful work. Simple cover, bbut not so simple music. A must for your collection of piano works.

Tu nous livre sur un plateau d'argent ,un album superbement maitrisé, le piano est magnifique !! les mélodies divine et bien rythmé .Tout les titres sont excelent et crées une ambiance relaxante, propice au rêve que j'aime beaucoup . Une préferance quand même pour 'the death of stars ' et i want to know ,que j'ai trouvé trés riche ,beaucoup aimé le synthé et la flute sur ce titre. Merci pour le partage !

A very weak attempt at electronic piano ambient. The tunes are primitive (with a catastrophic climax in the horrendous title track). They could maybe work as a soundtrack for Teletubbies or as background music in a hotel's elevator, but that's all. Then we have orchestration. The artist totally loses his grip when it comes to combining more tracks in one piece (see "The Death of a Star" again). Particular instruments do not form a cohesive whole, but rather fight with each other for supremacy. Pure piano pieces with only subtle synthesizer background are better (see "Passing Passion", the best on this album - I'd give it something like 5/10 rating). And finally, the biggest crime of Van Syla - use of primitive cheap keyboard with terrible plastic sound (or lousy samples on computer). It renders this album almost unlistenable for someone with even traces of musical hearing. There's nothing wrong with plastic sound, where it fits - where the artist deliberately goes for synthetic sound (see the whole 8bit genre, for example). But in such Oldfield-like music that Van Syla tries to record it does not fit at all. All these background effects that accompany piano are supposed to add space and atmosphere to the main piano melody. To achieve this they would have to sound natural. You cannot substitute a plastic bucket for a tubular bell, just because it is hollow. And you cannot substitute $20 Casio keyboard for real instruments, nature sounds and field recordings. It can be done with synthetic sounds, but it is really really difficult. It requires good equipment and high skills. Van Syla lacks at least one of them. Of course, piano on this album is probably also synthetic, but it sounds better (as usual). I don't know the reason - either piano is easier to mimic or keyboard makers have more experience, but they usually more or less succeed even in cheap equipment. The effect is almost never as atrocious as with other instruments or sounds. But maybe I am insane? As you can easily see this album is highly praised by the masses. So, can they all be wrong??? Well, it seems for many people the simple melody is everything they need (and the simpler and more primitive the better). These tunes could be written by a talented graduate of a two-week correspondence harmony course (or - these days - by a good computer program). That's OK with me, even if I don't dig it. Many genres feature primitive melodies (check out eurodance, for example) and may still be fun, if done properly. But festering this particular genre with cheap synthetic sounds is a crime (like it would be with classical or early music). That is something I cannot understand or accept. So, to summarize, if your favorite musical genre is nursery rhyme and you think you wouldn't notice if Mike Oldfield replaced tubular bells with steel barrels on his debut album – Van Syla is waiting for you with plenty of beautiful music. If not – for Mozart's sake, stay away!

There's no use in trying to walk by attempting to step beyond the length of the leg. Or trying to evaluate a Fiat 600, under the perspective of a Ferrari... they are both cars, it's clear, but serve different purposes... and have different objectives on their primary conceptions. This is music. And music is not an objective thing most of the times, if not always. Trying to analyze it under a rigid perspective, is to castrate it in someway. This is a very honest work. The instrumental resources may be limited, but the true commitment and great beauty it reveals through an honest musical construction and very pleasant melodic patterns, highly surpasses any of those handicaps. And this is why and in my humble opinion, I think that it's worth to listen to this work, provided that it's done under an adequate perspective. What you hear, is what you get... and what you get is unpretentious, uncomplicated, pure and very, very beautiful music.

sehr aufregendes Arrangement

Très jolies compostions, avec toujours cet allant qui caractérise ce compositeur. Une maîtrise du jeu pianistique live que j'admire beaucoup. Ma préférence va à deux titres : - In Your Eyes : très beau développement de la mélodie; - I Want To Know : une orchestration très sensible, riche de sonorités, une très grande délicatesse de la flûte, de belles reprises et comme toujours un développement magnifique et un final bien carré comme je les aime. Très beau travail. Merci pour le partage.

Qu'il soit classique, romantique ou baroque, ton piano est toujours sincère, généreux, sensible, délicat...c'est signe que si une étoile meurt, une autre va naître à coup sûr...que la passion ne passe pas, mais accompagne ton chemin ! J'aime particulièrement "In your eyes" pour la superbe mélodie Merci Syl :))

...aux mélodies sincères et subtiles qui se lisent "dans vos yeux". La partition est inscrite dans le coeur de l'Artiste et le partage se fait dans la simplicité d'un clin d'oeil ou l'esquisse d'un sourire, avec beaucoup de talent et d'émotions. Bravo et merci à Toi qui connais le langage des étoiles...

Me parece una música interesante para utilizarla de fondo, para leer tus textos por ejemplo, resulta melodiosa y agradable, le daría un ritmo ameno. Voy a probar, ya os contaré.

Glatte Punktzahl für dieses ambient Album,diese Melodien hier haben meine Sehnsüchte und Hoffnungen berührt,ein Hauch von Melancholie,eine leichte Traurigkeit aber gepaart mit eben Hoffnung liegt über diese Album,sehr schön gemacht,mein Favo-Song wäre "I want to know",einfach die Seele bei dem Song baummeln lassen und gedanklich irgendwo hinreisen wo man am liebsten wäre...