Jazz saxophonist Melissa Aldana has set her next album. The Chilean musician has set the February 13 release of Filin, a new album of ballads rooted in the Cuban filin tradition. Aldana will be joined by pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba, bassist Peter Washington, drummer Kush Abadey, and vocalist Cécile McLorin Salvant.
With the announcement, Aldana shared the project came from a desire to explore the idea of sound itself. “I transcribe Sonny Rollins, Wayne Shorter, John Coltrane, Joe Henderson, Lester Young, Charlie Parker, and Don Byas, among many others. For them the sound itself is a tool to express an emotion,” says the musician. “Every single note is a whole world. So there is a technical side to playing, but then there is this mystical side of sound that… I still don’t know exactly what it is.” The exploration led her and Rubalcaba to the filin genre. “They felt like the ballads that I love from the Great American Songbook,” Aldana continues, “but because the lyrics are in Spanish, I was able to connect to these songs in a way that I never thought I could.”
To help promote the album, Aldana will perform around the world. January 2026 will take her to New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles before she heads to Argentina and Chile in February. In March, Aldana will perform in Belgium, Sweden, Italy, Germany, and Spain before returning to New York in June.
Since signing to Blue Note Records in 2021, Aldana has released two albums. 2022 brought 12 Stars, which was inspired by tarot and astrology. In 2024, Aldana released Echoes Of The Inner Prophet. Of Filin, Aldana says of her process, “I was just trying to play inside the band — to leave space and be as present as I could, let the songs breathe. I’m older too, so I might be feeling less like I have something to prove. I also just felt in my gut that I wanted to do a ballads record, that I have something to say.”
