Sienna Spiro – Visitor

Some of the best music discoveries come along by chance. On a walking tour of Seattle the topic of music came up in the conversation with other walkers. Someone, I can’t remember, mentioned the delicious tones of Sienna Spiro. This singer was new to me but later I came across her debut release (in a departmental store in Oregon.) On the spur of the moment I invested in a vinyl copy and have subsequently found it to be a classy gem of magnificent sweeping romantic ballads often made more lush with sumptuous strings.

Spiro is a 21 year old Londoner who recorded this album in Los Angeles. Since 16 years old she’s been posting her work on social media and recorded her first release for wider circulation in 2024. From here it’s been dizzying progress to a contract with a major record label and this release. She’s written all the songs on the album: mostly in collaborations and not least with her producer Omer Fedi. The songs have a foot in the 20^th Century of popular crooners and classic balladeers; you could imagine Nelson Riddle arranging or Tony Bennett seeking to duet. Fedi himself is only 26 years old and doesn’t necessarily come from a background of Adele, Amy Winehouse, Frank Sinatra, Dinah Washington or Barbra Streisland that inform the sound of the album. He leaves her voice and its expressive and alluring siren tones to dominate. He’s been the perfect partner to create a great piece of art.

Her voice, that can swoop and soar, has the yearning and phrasing of Adele yet this sound can occasionally border on the gentle jazz that Amy Winehouse touched. Her lyrics are ruminations on relationships: sharing her doubts and vulnerabilities as she progresses along that euphoric yet predictably turbulent road. I loved all the album from the menacing and dramatic Bond-esque theme of Time, You & Me to the aching We’re Not In Love where the chorus enables her heartbreaking voice to sound like a mellifluous clarinet negotiating a difficult passage. Die On This Hill maybe has the most memorable melody, again another love song that gives full rein to her voice. Belying her young age He’s Not My Baby, I’m His is pure Amy Winehouse with a shuffle beat where Spiro relates a relationship with an older man.

Frankly, all that matters is whether it’s good or bad but you can’t help but marvel at her age, the way she inhabits what she sings and the enormous potential that lies ahead of her. She’s currently on a world tour including the USA, Tokyo and four nights in London. You could say she’s arrived! What a delightful find.