`Sanctus Ignis` is the debut album of Frenchman Stephan Forte. He combines his guitar playing with quite some classical arrangements. His biggest influence is obviously Yngwie Malmsteen. Other musicians are vocalist David Readman from Pink Cream 69, Elegy`s Dutch drummer Dirk Bruinenburg and Franck Hermany as bass player. Forte did most of the keyboards himself, but for the more complex solo`s, he asked Richard Anderson of Majestic, which makes the list complete. The music is a combination of bands such as Stratovarius and Symphony X. Power metal fans will probably like this album, just like prog metal fans will. I said earlier that there are also some classical arrangements. They add a lot to the variation of the CD, since power metal can sometimes get boring after a while. Don`t expect too much (complex) classical music though, like Therion. All in all, this album took me some time getting used to.

At first I thought the songs all sounded the same. After a couple of listenings, I heard more and more and found that the music was more complicated than I thought at first. Forte`s guitar solos are quite nice and he has composed the songs well. Most of the songs are heavy and fast paced. There aren`t really any slow songs on it, which I find a bit disappointing. Especially when you look at the possibilities with the classical music input. Maybe next time? There are 10 songs on this record. One of them is an instrumental cover of Led Zeppelin`s `Immigrant Song`, very well done. The last song on the album is a rough demo, called Niflheim. I don`t know why they put it on there. The sound quality isn`t very good and it doesn`t add anything to the rest of the songs. But hey, it`s just a bonus track. Overall, this is a good CD that can attract fans of power and prog metal.