Feven Yoseph has a special relationship with time. Perhaps it was because of the sky over the Ethiopian highlands where Feven grew up, a sky that seems so overwhelmingly close, that you feel you can touch its silky infinity with your own hands. It is one of these strong sensory impressions from her homeland that has found its way onto the second album of the singer born in Dese in 1990. Gize is the title of the record, which means "time" in Amharic, Feven's mother tongue. Feven Yoseph and her band from Berlin with Marina Sherstnova on keys, Fritz Bayer on guitar, Felix-Otto Jacobi on bass, Jakob Hegner on drums and trumpeter Marcus Rust achieve an organic combination of styles that draws from the rich heritage of African music as well as from sources of jazz, R&B and the Esperanto of pop. Feven Yoseph is doubtlessly following in the footsteps of such great African artists as Miriam Makeba or Angélique Kidjo. One might well describe her as the originator of a modern ethio-soul. Six years have passed between Feven Yoseph's jazzy debut album Chanting Soul. The patience has paid off, because the pieces were able to develop like the sweet honey wine Tej, which Feven sings about in the song "Gize Fetay". "It's a traditional drink for us that ferments and matures slowly in the dark. The waiting brings out something wonderful, something you can't get enough of." The same can be said of the nine uplifting songs on Gize. It's time for the world to get to know Feven Yoseph!