El Camino de Los Vientos

French-born agronomist Matthieu Saglio traded soil and crops for the sweetly sorrowful sound of the cello when he moved to Valencia in 2002. An accomplished player from his youth, having been awarded a Gold Medal for his classical music studies at the Conservatory of Rennes, he abandoned his short-lived agricultural career and took up the instrument professionally.

Mixing European jazz with flamenco and classical Western music with traditional Arabic tunes, he sees his fusing of styles as a way of establishing vital dialogue between cultures – work rewarded by his being appointed artist ambassador by the International Yehudi Menuhin Foundation. With fine support from the likes of Norwegian jazz trumpeter Nils Petter Molvær and French-Iranian percussionist Bijan Chemirani, this enjoyable album (whose title translates as ‘Way of the Winds’) acts as a showcase for Saglio's prodigious talent as a composer in numerous genres. Many tracks have a cinematic feel to them, making it no surprise to learn that he is also a sought-after creator of soundtracks for theatre, television and film. ‘El Abrazo’ discreetly references Pachelbel's Canon in a mournful tribute to the cellist's late grandfather while the jazzy ‘Caravelle’ pays recognisable homage to Ravel's Boléro in the same playful and highly successful way that Jacques Loussier did with Bach and Beethoven back in the 1960s.