Salenta De Badisdenne and Topu Lyo met in 2018 at a friend’s place in Bed-Stuy in Brooklyn. They decided to play Brooklyn duo Salenta De Badisdenne, pianist, and Topu Lyo, cellist, make blossoming, delicate reflections on music and inner life. There is no right or wrong way to what they do, there is hardly any editing afterwards. Theirs is a flow cultivated by an openness to the gentle atmospheres of being able to live perfectly in the moment. There is no overblown production, no electronics, just two instruments recorded in an intimate space to bring out floods of emotion that brim to the surface as they slowly get acquainted with each other. Their 2021 album Moon Set, Moon Rise has been something of a sleeper hit, building up momentum over the last couple of years as it connected with listeners enamored by its exquisite fragility. Salenta’s old piano has an unusual, folksy sound – like a discarded instrument you would find in the back room of an abandoned shack. Topu’s accompaniment is cleverly measured in response – there’s no gratuitous virtuosity, and at times he sounds as if he’s strumming on an old guitar, or scraping a well-loved family fiddle. The stuff dreams are made for.
https://salenta-topu.bandcamp.com/