In the Flow - Althea Rene (2013)

In the Flow 
Artist : Althea Rene
Release : 2013
Genre : Smooth Jazz
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Detroit based Althea Rene is the recent talk about female jazz flutist. She kinda the Beyonce of the jazz flutist, taking the community attention by releasing quality album by album in the past decades. With about four studio albums prior, "In The Flow" is Althea's fifth studio album, released in 2013. Once again, the album is a complete workout of flute in smooth jazz style in the same spirit as its predecessor. Described in her biography as once a deputy officer and learn music since tender age of four, Althea's journey in the jazz world is quite diverse and completed actually. Listen to the first track in this album "La 'Solstice", the composition begin with a blitzing flute riff only to follow by Latin guitar and a hip hop beat. The song quickly come out as the mix of the three genre, jazz, Latin and bit of hip hop, all lead by amazing flute playing.

The second track is much standard smooth jazz, "Sunday Cruise". In here we enjoy the pure beauty of flute sounds,  done very well in jazz. In Sunday Cruise, the other accompaniment melodist came from the guitarist. "Used to Love You" is yet another highlight of hip-hop infused into jazz. The usage of vocalized passage done then mimic by flute is very natural idea. The fourth track is an up beat of flute and saxophone duet. "Flutations" proved that flute is very intimidate instrument to be paired with saxophone, the different in tonality give a nice blend between the two instruments. Follow up is "Free", a sentimental slow song which came with brief passage of female voices. "FM 1960" is a latin-like piece, lots of tonging and other flute technique to be enjoyed on this one. "Snoochi Pooch" is rather complete composition where all other accompaniment played bigger role in making the song. Notable is trumpet solos here, credit as Cindy Bradley as guest soloist in the album. Finally is "In the Flow" the title song which really lifted up the name, this is one of best composition in the album. No wonder the song stayed as Billboard top hit, rumored said this is the first of it kind to enter such prestigious top chart. Another mellow tunes here is the second last song "H-Town-Step", a piano duet is for this one. One the last track is "Song for Wilhemania", as the title suggested a rather choral atmosphere here, beautiful melody to end the album.

In The Flow really flow between one track to another. A fully complete smooth jazz album where the flute take the highest attention as soloist. A perfect start for flute jazz enthusiast and perfect addition to any die hard jazz fans. Althea Rene backed up with many award winning composers for this album, as you can read in below credits.  All the songs have strong leading flute melody that easily remembered. In The Flow is one smooth jazz album that give flute shining well as main instruments.

In The Flow - Althea Rene (2013)
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01. La'Solstice
02. Sunday Cruise
03. Used to Love You
04. Flutations
05. Free
06. FM 1960
07. Snoochi Pooch
08. In the Flow
09. H-Town-Step
10. Song for Wilhemania

Performance Credits
Althea Rene   Flute,Alto Flute
Freddie Fox   Guitar
Michael White   Drums
Randy Scott   Saxophone
John Herrera   Drums
Mike Broening   Keyboards
Thano Sahnas   Acoustic Guitar
Dan Cipriano   Trombone,Trumpet,Saxophone
Cindy Bradley   Trumpet
Mel Brown   Bass

Technical Credits
Deniece Williams   Composer
Nathan Watts   Composer
Mike Broening   Composer,Programming,Producer,Engineer
Kanye West   Composer
John Legend   Composer
Althea Rene Composer

In the Flow Althea Rene - Album review