Miguel SANCHEZ is a Spanish guitarist who puts me in mind of two things: Ottmar Liebert, with his "nouveau flamenco" style of updating Spanish guitar music, and Kepa Junkera, the Basque accordionist who inflects his folk music with influences from Africa and Ireland.
SANCHEZ add a few more things into the mix, most notably jazz, but also sitar, steel pan drums, string quartet, and some electric guitar.
The mood is mainly on the mellow side, and sometimes dangerously close to "worldlite", but the playing is superb throughout, and on the more energetic tracks, the players really show their stuff.
"Mi Rollo" gives me a definite McLaughlin/Shakti feeling, only with Latin percussion instead of tabla. For "Jam at Dé Studio", SANCHEZ sets his guitar aside in favor of a clay drum for a duet with drummer Stéphane Huchard, which leads into the album's two jazziest tracks, "Siete Cuatro", which features great sax work from Emmanuele Cisi, a muezzin-like vocal section, and a lead-out riff in seven; and "This", a ten-minute workout for drums, fretless bass, acoustic guitar, and sax.
There are several different styles of vocals exhibited, from African to Indian to Spanish, which may provide the main distraction for most people, but overall the instrumental sections dominate, and the CD is very enjoyable.

USA - EXPOSE - Jon DAVIS

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Miguel SANCHEZ - Thalisma

A beautiful release. Miguel SANCHEZ, "el Canijo" has the gift of knowing how to mix perfectly flamenco, jazz and even some new age music.
And that is perfectly demonstrated on this release where he makes a great combination of his influences.
There are also some eastern sounding melodies (this feeling is enhanced because of the use of exotic instruments in this context). I like the way SANCHEZ plays his guitar letting it breath with arpéggios and making some interesting melodies.
Also there is a great work on vocals that are closer to flamenco than to the other styles mentioned above. There are plenty of phrases done by the instruments here doing some scales (a lot of phrygian modes and harmonic minor sounds).
Also there are a lot of guest musicians who help to make this album a great one.
Favourite tracks: "Fuente de Colores", "Punta Paloma" and "Siete Cuatro".