Following the success of her Odradek release Caminante, award-winning Spanish cellist and composer Andrea Casarrubios returns with Seven, which features seven of her most recent chamber works, all in world-premiere recordings. Alongside works for solo cello or cello and piano, the recording features a Chicago Symphony Orchestra commission for the distinctive combination of clarinet, violin, viola and cello, and culminates in Casarrubios’s Piano Quintet, a tender tribute to California’s Central Coast.
Together, the mesmerising pieces on this album encompass a truly significant period in history: the years before and after 2020. At the heart of this collection lies SEVEN for solo cello, a piece that has become central to Casarrubios’s life as a composer. The title alludes to the 7pm tribute offered to healthcare workers during lockdown. Through the music, she sought to explore the contradiction between solitude and community; that unique emotional complexity precipitated by the overwhelming challenges of 2020
