InFlightPress

This review must open with the second piece of  the night for the emotional punch caused me to stagger home and sleep poorly  from effect of speakers, trumpet and saxophone.

Leaving UMI Café shattered; upset to the core is too unusual.  The kind audiences and patrons, the owners of UMI knew that Craig Pedersen and composer Taylor Brook  experienced some pain at Stuart Lake in Fort St. James British Columbia.  Craig told us of the tempestuous lake, the gruesome clear cuts and the Spartan life of the tree planters.  We were told to prepare for the flow of menace and beauty in the soundscape to come.  Craig  like a self flagellating Christian hermit stood and delivered through the three year span of experience with nature’s destruction, nature’s strength and the dichotomyof resource utility and depletion. 

Yoda tells us, “There is no try. Just do.”  Like a young Luke Skywalker in the caves and swamps of Dagobah, Craig met and slew the menace only to open the helmet’s shutter to see his own face atop the body of Darth Vader.  In the Empire Strikes Back (1980), we watched with some innocence as Luke learned to focus and pay attention to the force.  Craig Pedersen, like a stoic slave, stood alert to the score and openings for his Rolland sound effects patterned trumpet to sore.  The sampled back drop ranged from eerie to disturbing and included moments of splendour.  We all had to wait so long for Star Wars Episode III, 2005, Revenge of the Sith, before we witnessed the origin ofthe new Sith Lord of the dark side. Craig too waited years for this composition and opportunity to stand and represent some of what we now regard as “human loss of self” in natures destruction. The Photos of Louis Helbig’s, aerial views of Albetra’s Tar Sands, would stand in well as back drop to, “Stuart Lake”.   As the forty nine minutes of nature vs man emerged I felt that time-lapse photography; a month’s worth of skies and landscapes flashed by on a screen each minute.

Linsey sat to open the night.  In an athlete’s T-shirt and a posture of  strength atop a chair for balance, he warmed into Ephemera setting feet and  elbows, spine and core just so.  Thirty plus notes were constructed and tweaked in successive gesture.  Linsey divined an                      “algo-rythum” the envy  of  PS3. Ears, chest and some place behind our eyes were involved in listening to the alto sax bellow and chime.   

Ten minutes in, a loud Middle East  discussion  broke out.  Part chaos, part revolution  or riot, these animated Mediterranean folk erupted in coffee shop banter.  Students insistent on change argued with old men, demanding respect.  Women clamoured  for fair share and gave an earful to make a strong point.  It was as though a hookah and tiny cups of  Turkish coffee were abruptly tossed about in Cairo or Tripoli.  This place in the concert was no place for tourists.  Linsey is time zones away inconcentration.  His horn worked hard to  insist order upon discord.  Night fallsand urgent messages one hundred and forty characters each are tweeted out to  plan the next movement.  Like a camp fire  “telephone game” Linsey’s message is altered just a little with every  repeat.  Cheeks and embouchure embrace  this tune, this room these times.  His  fingers hardly move but key taps open and close in quick succession.  This man is a clean air champion.  We all must have been breathing parts of his DNA as he ventilated the room with steamy nostril flair. 

The sax rested on the seventh movement.  Lower stronger tones spoke of lover’s sex.  Yes even in the riots babies are  made and born in private.  There is hope in this section twenty five minutes in. Stress must be relieved.  The lovers cry at birth and mourn the disappeared or killed.  Passion's phosphor glow, grows in Cairo's beds.  Linsey “speaks as he plays”…what does he sing of?  Leaders of the Arab nations do not sleep this eve.  The Bur jAl Arab still sparkles in the night. Jets pass the UAE enroute to Silk Road destinations.  Linsey is our pilot on this Aladdin like ride. 

Just as silent travelers pass our window seats  street side, the cock crows and Linsey plays a morning call to prayer.  The air is full of the smell of  fresh baked pita loaves.  Linsey checks his road map; eyes open for the first time in many minutes. He knows a dozen routes home and like the curious of Cairo we ask him to take  the long way.  Cross the Nile,circle around Tahrir Square.  Linsey  blows a dessert song that tells of traveling dunes.  Slow and steady on this route.  We are reminded of long reigning Pharaoh’s of the past.  Alexander is buried near here.  We are in the company of a Great  one.  We are allowed to relax and center  ourselves.  Linsey makes electric sounds.  The artist’s chemistry is afire.  Neurons, eyes and hearts enjoy this  space.  He sits, permits, the seconds  pass, and time is up.  Linsey checks his watch.  All arrivals are on time.

Sunday, March sixth, IMOO returns to UMI Café  featuring eldritch priest and his score, “the brown study”.  We heard eldritch as a key performer in Uzumaki a few weeks ago.  Thanks to eldritch  for correcting me on what I’d called an electronic tuning device.  It is a blue light emitting, “E-Bow” and it was used to fine effect in recent concerts by eldritch and Kim Myhr. 

As a composer and performer, eldritch has a  skill  for,  “drawing the listener into a convulsive, rhizomic zone of  inquiry."  -- Marc Couroux (2007). 

Be it Lion or Lamb, we look forward to the first concert of March at UMICafé.