The Bagpipe Society

CD Review: Serenin by Cabit

‘Serenin’ was born out of a project by Ligurian duo CABIT (Edmondo Romano and Davide Baglietto) to collaborate with Turkish musicians and celebrate the ancient cultural exchanges and connections between Ligurian and Greek-Turkish music. With this in mind they chose songs and tunes that work well with a mixed ensemble of Italian and Turkish musicians and instruments from both folk traditions. Making two connected but disparate traditions sit well together musically is a tough challenge and it doesn’t always achieve a sound that is more than the sum of the parts. But you can’t fault the playing, the choice of material and the life affirming and infectious Mediterranean spirit on show. Sounds like they left nothing behind in the rehearsal room and gave it their all.

Bagpipes - musa pastorale/piva (Liguria) and tulum (Turkey) feature well and the standout for me is the tulum playing of Filiz Ilkay Balta. The sophistication of her playing on the ‘standard’ Ho nenni is wonderful and the way she supports the voices on La bella Laurin / Trabzon uzun havasi (which brings together a wedding song from the piffero repertoire with a droving song from the Trebizond area) made me cry in a good way. Alessandria in Re works well too as a piffero/pipes duo bringing together a well known piffero tune over a rhythmic gro