“Muunduja”, by Maarja Nuut & Ruum.

The enormous figure of Arvo Pärt (alive and kicking at the age of 83) is the most prominent figure on the Estonian music scene of the 20th and 21st centuries. In an ascending phase, the young singer and violinist Maarja Nuut – born in 1986 – has been steadily building a career that goes beyond her beginnings in the field of Estonian folk music to build one of the most defined classical trajectories of the Baltic republic today. Muunduja means “change” in Estonian. It is her third album, and her first collaboration with fellow Estonian Hendrik Kaljujärv, who works in the field of electronic music under the pseudonym Ruum, composer of choreography scores and sound environments in art galleries. The combination of their personalities has resulted in a work that makes its two creators amplify their palette of colours to create an ambient and tremendously imaginative album, situated somewhere between classical auditoriums, world music festivals and, at times, contemplative electronica (with some rhythmically more saturated pieces).