Duval Timothy - Sen Am

The Guardian 60

(Carrying Colour)

Duval Timothy is something of a renaissance man – a fashion designer, conceptual artist, pop-up restaurateur and composer. His solo piano pieces are somewhere on the boundaries between contemporary minimalism and jazz: precise, geometrical constructions featuring heart-rending chord changes and simple melodies. Dust and Whale are curious, Satie-esque waltzes, while Ibs sounds like a piece of pulsating gospel piano put through a Michael Nyman filter. His pieces with more adventurous synth voicings sound more like promising preparatory sketches that could provide the basis for remixes – a duet with guitarist Nicholas Mandalos called Language is a nod to Thundercat’s bass-led astral soul, while the percussive Wahala recalls the incidental music that the BBC Radiophonic Workshop might have written for Doctor Who. Throughout the album, Timothy weaves in recordings of friends and relatives from Sierra Leone, making the entire collection sound like an immersive, cross-cultural dialogue. He’s a hugely promising talent.