(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)
(Original English text by Piero Scaruffi)
The Greek-born Yanni Chryssomallis (born in Greece in 1954, a psychology graduate of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where he played in a rock band until 1984, and self-taught) was perhaps the most famous and charismatic exponent of the melodic electronics of new-age music.
Optimystique, his first album (recorded in Minneapolis in 1980 but released only in 1984), exploded with a bang into the bucolic world of new age with its highly melodic, rhythmic, and arranged electronic sketches, sometimes inspired by Richard Clayderman's orchestra (Butterfly Dance), at other times violently funky-soul (The Sphinx). Yanni was above all capable of launching into vertiginous piano fantasies, accelerating some Mozartian idea at breakneck speed (The Magus, Strings) or detonating Bachian figures into exhilarating progressions (Twilight).
After Keys To Imagination (also recorded in Minneapolis and released in 1986), which confirmed without adding anything new the formidable energy of his romantic tours de force (see the overwhelming Nostalgia and Santorini) and the exotic fascination of his pictorial digressions (see Port Of Mystery), on the album Out Of Silence Yanni would reveal himself above all as an imitator of the symphonic and hyper-romantic Vangelis of Chariots Of Fire. His most famous themes would then be After The Sunrise, heroic and symphonic; The Mermaid, a poignant melody of electronic tinklings; and the romantic Within Attraction.
Yanni would also attempt a more disco-oriented rhythmic harmony (with the album Chamaleon Days), but at the cost of much of his appeal (with the exception of the Tchaikovskian orchestral fantasies A Word In Private and Reflections Of Passion).
Meanwhile, after relocating to Los Angeles, he had begun a prolific career as a composer of soundtracks for Hollywood movies: Steal the Sky (1988), Heart of Midnight (1988), I Love You Perfect (1989), She'll Take Romance (1990), When You Remember Me (1990), Children of the Bride (1990), ...
By then, Yanni had become the superstar of new-age music.
And with the tear-jerking elegies of Niki Nana (1989), he would arrive at the sentimental stereotype of easy-listening orchestras, with the piano now in the foreground and two concentrated doses of tenderness such as Quiet Man and First Touch.
Dare To Dream perhaps represents the Baroque peak of his career. It is a much more reflective album, one that gives less room to spectacle. Aria, written with Malcolm McLaren, is a vocal composition based on an aria (indeed) by Delibes. You Only Live Once and Desire are perhaps the liveliest pieces on an album that does everything possible not to be lively. Once Upon A Time, A Love For Life, and To The One Who Knows are the most crystalline melodies.
In My Time reduces the impact even further, neglecting rhythms in favor of the piano. The music becomes increasingly personal and less and less exhibitionistic. The piano sonatas and whispers of string orchestra are concentrated doses of all the pathos that had been diluted in the pompous arrangements of the preceding albums.
All the pieces are driven by his characteristic singable themes, so spontaneous that they seem obvious. Yanni therefore has no difficulty moving among the most varied moods, from In The Morning Light, immersed in the contemplative mood of a religious psalm, to Only A Memory and Before I Go, which exude nostalgia. From the depths of the soul (the poignant One Man's Dream) to the most superficial gesture (the banal pop refrain of To Take To Hold), Yanni effortlessly dominates half the universe of new age. Even in this relatively stripped-down style, Yanni manages to offer examples of unrestrained sensationalism: Enchantment displays one of the epic surges for which he is famous, Felitsa launches into a romantic gallop in the manner of John Tesh, and In The Mirror recalls the most vertiginous rhapsodies of his career.
All his later albums have been major commercial successes.
Lush, flamboyant, passionate, Yanni's style is certainly one of the most influential in electronic new age.
Devotion (Private, 1997) is an anthology.
Steal The Sky (Rhino, 1999) was the soundtrack to a 1988 television documentary.
Albums of the 21st century include: If I Could Tell You (2000), Ethnicity (2003), Yanni Voices (2009), Mexicanisimo (2010), Truth of Touch (2011), My Passion for Mexico (2012), Inspirato (2014), Sensuous Chill (2016), and In His Purest Form (2020).
