Dare to be You

Dare to Dream is Yanni's first new material in three years and finds the new age composer fitting his unflinchingly romantic arrangements into tighter song structures. The surging synth backgrounds, insistent piano lines, and general grandiosity that mark Yanni's sound are still intact. But tracks like "Love for Life" or "Nice to Meet You" harness that famously epic energy in smaller stables. This tactic works especially well on the latter track, which is led by the wail of an electric fiddle. Elsewhere, Yanni plucks the heartstrings with "In the Mirror" and "So Long My Friend" – two weepy ballads that cascade like sheets of rain on a lonely city street. The seven-minute "You Only Live Once" becomes the only really epic piece on Dare to Dream, and it's pleasant enough.