Spencer Zahn’s Statues I is a return to the hushed palette of solo piano lyricism. This focused sparseness comes after the sprawling, lushness of his critically acclaimed 2022 album, Pigments, with Dawn Richard. Living life centered around writing, Zahn sets aside a window each day to play the piano and find beauty in its details. Statues I is the first chapter of an ambitious double-album.
The second half of Spencer's contemporary opus was actually completed before the first, working out of his home studio in Kingston, NY. Hints of synthesizer seep between silences; fragments of different sessions emerge and overlap; horns are reharmonized, then set aloft like paper lanterns; tunings wobble up or down an octave, embracing the malleable, the liquid, the hope springing eternal. Zahn’s vision is fluid, but grounded by heart.