The Random Hubiak Recommends: Bettina Joy De Guzman
Well, I did promise that I’d post one more blog and send one more newsletter this week for the sole purpose of promoting another artist recommendation, but that also gives me a chance to correct a really bone-headed typo from yesterday, when I referred to my drummer, Paul Galiszewski, as a guitar god. Ha! He is a god of percussion, and I guess during our two days in the studio last week, he smote me with so much percussion that I couldn’t use my words properly.
With that, I bring you this week’s artist recommendation: Bettina Joy De Guzman.
Bettina has a brand new album out, entitled Athanatos. The album is a collection of seventeen recordings she released individually over the past year and (for those of you who don’t speak Greek) means “Immortal.” Her music consists of translations of ancient Greek texts, sometimes into English, as well as her own original compositions in Greek, Roman, and Sumerian that explore ancient mythologies, sometimes through direct translation and sometimes re-envisioned through her own original articulation of an ancient tale. What her recordings bring to the available plethora of modern recordings is a link to the ancient philosophical, theological, and psychological delving into mankind’s psyche and soul, a thought process that eschews the limited navel-gazing that can bind a purely egocentric writer. This artist has entered into the mind of each spirit that occupies each song.
Working in the studio alongside internationally renowned classicist Michael Levy, Bettina has crafted compositions are both calming and propulsive. Lyrics are set to lyre music with some additional sparse instrumentation to create an authentic air of ancient mysticism and romance. The songs are enchanting and entrancing. It’s no accident that she has two versions of her song sung from the perspective of the enchantress Circe. Nor is it by chance that there is a song about the Sirens: hers is a call equally mesmerizing.
If you wish to stream the entire album, YouTube is a great place to do so (it’s free to you and pays higher streaming revenues than either Spotify or Pandora, excluding the premium services).
And you can subscribe to her on YouTube.
If you like what you hear, you can purchase a copy at CDBaby.
Official Twitter handle: @ancientlyric