Santo Spirito Blues

Santo Spirito Blues is the twenty-third studio album by British singer-songwriter Chris Rea, released in 2011 by his independent record label Jazzee Blue and Rhino Entertainment.

Summary
The album, titled "Santo Spirito Blues" marked a distinctive project. In addition to the standard CD edition, a deluxe version was released, featuring two DVDs containing documentaries titled "Bull Fighting" and "Santo Spirito," along with two CDs containing the soundtracks of these documentaries.

Chris Rea drew inspiration for the album from the Santo Spirito church in Florence during a visit to his daughter. Regarding the first documentary, his interest was piqued by the theme of bullfighting and matadors, including figures like Julián López Escobar. However, during a trip to Seville, when he attended a bullfight, he was horrified by the harsh reality. He left the event, stating that "there are two sides to that story because even after the bull is half dead, the bullfighter still has to be really brave."

The documentary "Bull Fighting" (59 minutes) offers a raw and brutally honest chronicle of bullfighting. It features neo-classical and Spanish-themed gypsy music. The second documentary, "Santo Spirito" (55 minutes), adopts the appearance of a Russian 1930s black and white film. It follows a man on a quest for truth in religion in the city of Florence—a journey he may or may not wish he had undertaken. Both documentaries were written and directed by Rea, with assistance from filmmaker Scott McBurney.[citation needed] Rea recalls that he created these films "just so that I could compose the music." The second documentary was broadcast in September 2011 on Tagesschau German television service.

Reception
Jon O'Brien in review for AllMusic rated the album 3/5 stars and concluded that the "overall ambitious concept proves that the just-turned-sixty-year-old certainly no longer holds any commercial aspirations". Artur Schulz for laut.de gave it the same score, and noted it has a mixture of both authentic blues and his pop-rock catchy work (particularly "The Chance of Love") from the "Dancing with Strangers" era, "with mostly good results: Chris manages the balancing act between fun and seriousness mostly effortlessly". Luke Turner in BBC review noted that it is a "straightforward homage to blues traditionalism [...] playing is exemplary, his songwriting accomplished, the boxes ticked", but being too focused on guitar playing, besides "The Chance of Love" his "gravelly voice [...] struggles to be heard".

Personnel

 * Producer, Filmmaker, Cover Painting: Chris Rea
 * Engineer, Mixing Engineer: Paul Casey
 * Mastering Engineer: Tim Young, Jon Kelly
 * Photographer, Filmmaker: Scott McBurney