Hildegard’s new album is a blessed union of avant-garde R&B saints

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Hildegard de Bingen, the revered 11th-century German saint of medieval musical history, had a cheat code for creating music: He received it as a vision from God. As he once explained in a letter: “I composed and sang songs with melodies in praise of God and the saints, again without any human instruction, although I had never learnt neums [early musical notation] or singing.”

Hildegard, the eponymous Montreal duo of Ouri and Helena Deland, may not have such a direct line to the Almighty, but their new album Jour 1596, out Oct. 18, nonetheless succeeds at creating a sacred geometry in the angles between its jazz-inflected, avant-garde R&B.

What were you struggling with four years ago? The pandemic? A death? A breakup? A creative project? What does that struggle look like now? Perhaps it’s a defining moment in your life, or a nothing event that evokes a smirk and a shake of the head. The music of Jour 1596 invites such reflection even before learning that the title is taken from the amount of time — 1,596 days — the two musicians spent writing and recording the 10-track LP. Their last record, 2021’s self-titled debut, was written over eight days, with its song titles (“Jour 1,” Jour 2,” etc) tracking every 24-hour block. Jour 1596 is both a tongue-in-cheek nod to that era and a closing of the band’s first chapter.

Jour 1596 is a less brash and more playful listen than the Hildegard LP. The first album had a darker density to its production while Jour 1596 doesn’t shy away from levity. Opener “Bach In Town” announces this vibe in a Soulquarians-meets-Arthur Russell jam about reconnection. Deland’s voice projects anticipation and coyness: “Something in me advises/ To leave you to your own devices/ Though I don’t know If I’ll see you again.”

When Billie Eilish first exploded, a raft of imitators sought to capture her breakout vibe: the breathy sound known as ASMR pop, named for the non-sexual tingling sensations it can induce. It wouldn’t be accurate to say Jour 1596 was substantially inspired by early Eilish — the production lacks Eilish’s goofiness, and both artists have a lyrical heft to match their vocal talents. Still, it’s not hard to imagine the most accessible moments of Jour 1596, like the shuffling “Pour Your Heart Out” and the crisp, smoldering “Remember Me, finding an audience broader than anything Ouri and Deland have reached individually thus far.

Jour 1596 excels in the natural fusion of its two endlessly curious artists, like they’re two hydrogen molecules coming together in search of oxygen to make pure, perfect water. Deland is best known as an acclaimed indie folk singer from her projects Someone New and Goodnight Summerland; Ouri is a classically trained composer fluent in the cello, piano, and harp, and successfully muddled this world with electronica and R&B on her 2021 solo LP, Frame of a Fauna. Moments like “Melody I Heard” aren’t located at the exact equator between the two artists but in some nebulous, new middle ground you’d never have expected.

The craft behind Jour 1596 is clear; what’s unusual is how the music digs its claws into your mind, seeming to draw its power from our engagement with it. Even with the project’s relatively protracted development, it still manages to achieve a new and deeper flow state, a lattice of its two artists’ considerable talents. Jour 1596 may not be literally holy, but it’s divine nonetheless.