Alexis Ffrench will make a stop on his upcoming tour in Chicago at The Stan Mansion, located at 2408 N. Kedzie Blvd., playing two sets on December 11; at 6:30 and 8:45 p.m.
He will be performing original songs from his latest effort Classical Soul Vol 1.
Photo caption: THE STAN MANSION in Chicago’s Logan Square Historic District was originally a Masonic lodge for the Knights Templars. Cera Stan later purchased and restored the building, preserving its historic charm.
On this album, Ffrench breathes his trademark classical grace into some of the great soul hits he grew up with. The pianist dovetails arrangements of these classics, by Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin and Bill Withers among others, with a selection of his own music. The album juxtaposes solo tracks with moments where the piano is carried aloft by Ffrench’s often breathtakingly beautiful string accompaniments.
“For me, this album is all about the music that I love,” Ffrench tells Apple Music Classical. “I really wanted to go back to my earliest days of coming to know music, or imagining music, and being part of that story when I was about four or five years old.”
He added: “I wanted to recreate this ‘inner symphony,’ those feelings that I felt back then,” he explains, “born from the echoes of those soul classics, but reframed through this wellspring of hopefully timeless melody and tethered to my classical story.”
Ffrench is a British “Classical Soul” pianist, composer, musician and producer who has amassed 1 billion streams, host of Apple Music’s “Classical Connections,” has fans including John Mayer and Tori Kelly, performed for the Royal Family, one of BBC Young Musicians judges, and has broken barriers in the UK for his genre-fluid approach to classical music, education and more.
His latest album Classical Soul Vol. 1 was released earlier this fall, and he’s performing a special holiday/Christmas show in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York City this December, performing from his CHRISTMAS PIANO album.
Check out his video for “O Holy Night” & “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” (LIve At Royal Albert Hall) & his original song “Soar” from his latest album Classical Soul Vol 1.
Ffrench is the fastest-growing classical artist in the world. “Not only does Alexis rank among the Top 10 most streamed classical artists, globally, he has headlined London’s iconic Royal Albert Hall, collaborated with top fashion houses Miyake and Hugo Boss, played Latitude Festival, worked with pop superstar Paloma Faith, composed several major film scores and shares the same management team as Little Mix & Niall Horan.”
Both albums ‘Evolution’ and ‘Dreamland’ reached No. 1 in the classical music charts. ‘Truth’, his latest album, is his most powerful and political to date, and also his most optimistic. “I imagined what the world would look like if everybody had the opportunity to ask themselves the questions ‘who am I?’ and ‘what is my purpose in the world?’ and what we, as a human race, could create and change together.”
Featuring Alexis’ sumptuous piano & orchestra sound, alongside rare collaborations including the searingly soulful ‘One Look’ with his friend Leona Lewis, ‘Truth’ encapsulates Alexis’ ability to cross musical boundaries, effortlessly, with vivid, lyrical, life-affirming elegies that capture Alexis’ hopes for the future and his belief that change is already upon us.
On the surface, Ffrench’s classical story reads like any other gifted musician’s: organist at the local church in Surrey, England, he went on to study at the Royal Academy, the Purcell School, and the Guildhall School of Music.
But while classical music formed the foundations of his training, Ffrench harbored an equal passion for soul—Mozart and Bach on equal terms with Stevie Wonder and Jodi Mathis. Roberta Flack’s hit “Killing Me Softly” inspires in him as much feeling and polish as when he takes on the famous motif from Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony in “Fate,” featuring beatbox from Kevin Olusola, alongside members of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra’s string section.
A passionate advocate for music education, Alexis is the first ever Artistic Director of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music in its 132-year history, and is a Governing Body Member and Trustee of the Royal Academy of Music, London.
Take a bit of time for what promises to be a lovely evening to check out Alexis Ffrench next Wednesday, December 11. For ticket information, visit https://feverup.com/m/257559.
