Beautiful piano melodies, ballads drawing their inspiration from jazz, classical music and cinematic imagery, hummed choruses, a mood at the crossroad of nostalgia and reverie, instruments with uncanny timbre and charm, chiseled percussions, added to a subtle electronic production, this is the recipe for Tout Va Bien, the second solo album by French composer Ezechiel Pailhès. All this is reflected in the opening track, River Day, which begins with “prepared piano” sounds (a technique mastered by Ezechiel, which consists in placing different objects on the strings of the piano, to create singular percussive notes). This deliberately mysterious and poetic introduction, supported by light electronic effects, is soon combined with a light beat, organ chords and vocalisations by the artist, which gradually transform the track into a ritornello, with both nostalgic and lighthearted tones. As the artist states it: “We could describe this type of emotion as a kind of endearing nostalgia, close to saudade,” i.e. the Portuguese term expressing the idea of a light melancholy stripped of its sickly aspect, or a “haunted craving” as the singer and composer Pierre Barouh nicely put it. “This feeling comes naturally to me when I write. Generally, in my music, I seek a form of soothing, of eternity even, (without meaning to sound pretentious). This is something I encounter in classical music, which is what I listen to most.” Even if he defines himself as a “jolly fellow” (which is confirmed by the music and reputation of his electro-pop duo Nôze), when chatting to him, he comes across as quite gentle and stellar, just like this collection of eleven tracks that he composed “in autarky” ...