ROUGGE – Cordes

Self Release

After having bathed in the lavish string orchestrations-cum-wordless-falsetto-vocalism distinguishing this EP by Nancy’s Rougge (whose real name I couldn’t manage to discover, but it’s not so important) I was mildly surprised to find out that his first musical studies were on the classical guitar. Then again, the academic groundwork definitely influenced a style reminding of a cross between Wim Mertens/Soft Verdict circa Struggle For Pleasure and a super-bantamweight version of Michael Nyman. However, please consider the above comparisons as a somewhat frivolous game, for Rougge surely belongs to another operative area. A rather lonely place where earnest inspirations might get this music ready for emotional auditorium performances. Still, given the kind of romantic introspectiveness defining the pieces – at times dangerously approaching the “too sentimental” grade – the risk is quite high for the pianist to be allured by the most offensive commercial facets of superficial melodiousness. Apparently, he is not interested in pursuing that objective; should his creativity remain at levels of decorous sincerity, we would be satisfied.