DD Rey: Victor Sbrovazzo rediscovers the solo path

After more than ten years on the road with Dirty Deep, Victor Sbrovazzo has rediscovered the pleasure of playing solo under the name DD Rey. A handful of solo shows after Covid brought back an urge he thought he had left behind. With Ashes of My Forgotten Letters, he now fully embraces his love of blues and American roots music. A new project he will bring to the Café de la Danse in Paris on October 5.

Rediscovering the pleasure of playing solo

It all started in the aftermath of Covid, with the difficulty of planning ahead and a few solo dates after ten years spent playing as a trio with Dirty Deep. Victor Sbrovazzo makes no secret of it: “One of the first things that made me think about going back to a solo format from time to time was simply the current situation and some of the difficulties we’ve had trying to plan ahead since Covid.”

Those first shows nevertheless brought something back. “I played one or two solo dates again after ten years, and I rediscovered the pleasure of it. At first, I didn’t think I really wanted to do something again without my brothers on stage, but I found a certain flavour in it again. Very different, of course, but still enjoyable.” Returning to solo performance therefore happened almost naturally, without calling Dirty Deep’s story into question.

There was still the question of what to call it. Dirty Deep had originally started as a solo project in 2011, but after a decade of audiences seeing the band travel the roads as a trio, Victor Sbrovazzo no longer felt completely comfortable using that identity on his own. “People have been seeing us touring as a three-piece for too long now, and I no longer felt entirely comfortable going out under that name alone, carrying it like a solitary flag.”

The new name came naturally. “DD” keeps the initials of Dirty Deep, while “Rey” is his mother’s family name. A way of keeping a connection with the past while giving this new project an identity of its own.

Both feet in the blues

The new name also draws a clearer line between the two projects. With Dirty Deep, blues has always been the backbone brought by Victor Sbrovazzo, but the trio also likes to push boundaries and mix everyone’s influences. With DD Rey, he no longer needs to find that collective balance: “I’ve always brought the blues backbone to Dirty Deep, along with other closely related American styles. With the trio, we try to break the rules a little so that everyone gets something out of it. Here, I’m diving headfirst into the styles I love.”

Blues therefore takes centre stage again, surrounded by folk, Americana and, more broadly, the American musical culture that has accompanied Victor Sbrovazzo since the beginning. With DD Rey, he is no longer trying to bend those influences into another shape. He can simply go straight towards what he loves.

Winner of the 2026 Challenge Blues Français, he has found in this project a space that is more personal, but also freer.

Ashes of My Forgotten Letters, a deeply personal album

That freedom runs throughout Ashes of My Forgotten Letters. Style, lyrics, arrangements, artistic direction: this time, it is difficult to separate the artist from the record. Asked what is most personal about the album, Victor Sbrovazzo answers with an image: “I think that would be like asking which part of a tree is alive. Everything on this album is personal: the style, the artistic direction, the lyrics, the arrangements.”

The songs deal with love, doubt, solitude, inner impulses and resilience. Pour Me Help in particular reveals a more intimate side to his songwriting, far removed from Dirty Deep’s more forceful energy. But the personal side of the album is not limited to the lyrics. It runs through the whole record, right down to the way Victor Sbrovazzo describes it: “It’s a seat between two windows, one looking into my head, the other into my heart.”

Live as the project’s other side

Even before releasing his first studio album, DD Rey chose to put out Ashes – Live Sessions. Another way of presenting these songs, with even less distance between the musician and the listener.

On stage, Victor Sbrovazzo is not trying to recreate the power of a trio on his own. Quite the opposite. He wants to make the most of what this format offers in terms of directness: “An intimate experience, I think. Just raw emotion, sharing and sweat.”

And when he describes what he has in mind for DD Rey, he uses an image far removed from the usual concert setting: “I want to present it as if I were the first hiker to set up camp, welcoming tired walkers around the fire at the end of an exhausting day.” A guitar, a harmonica, a voice and a handful of songs to create that sense of closeness.

See him at the Café de la Danse

DD Rey will perform in Paris at the Café de la Danse on October 5, opening for D.K. Harrell. The show comes just a few weeks after the release of Ashes of My Forgotten Letters and will offer the chance to discover this new format in its natural setting: the stage.

What initially looked like a handful of solo dates has now found a real place alongside Dirty Deep. Not to replace the trio, but to allow Victor Sbrovazzo to follow another path. One where, this time, he can put both feet firmly in the blues.