de Volkskrant, Saturday 26th June 2004

Voice painting

Global Groove, Amsterdam Roots Festival. 24th June,
de Melkweg, Amsterdam.

While there's already a crowd in front of the stage where the Libanian/French rapper Clotair K is delivering his thumping hip hop, upstairs in the virtually empty Melkweg theatre three gentlemen of around 50 climb the stage. The little one in the middle, dressed in wondrous clothing featuring embroidery, chords and brushes, is Sami joiker Wimme Saari, a resident of the Finnish part of Lapland. The man behind the silly keyboard is Jari Kokkonen and the suited gentleman seated on the chair playing ukulele, mandoline and guitar goes by the name of Matti Wallenius.

Those unaware of what they are about to witness, could be fooled into thinking this might be the Finnish variant of Jiskefet [Dutch comedy show]. But the just under 20 visitors in the hall know better. They have come especially for the first Dutch show of the man who transformed the traditional singing style of the Sami, also derogatorily called 'Laps', to a music spanning dance, techno, ambient, rock and even hillbilly and blues.

Completely concentrated and without any theatrical showing off Wimme starts his concert. The first sounds coming from his throat still cause some faint giggling from the crowd, but soon they go deadly quiet. Breathlessly the by now somewhat enlarged crowd hang on his lips. Saari moans, pants and snarls his heart out. Like a true shamaan he entrances his audience.

After the engrossing Kaimmas, a piece unfortunately not yet released on album, Wimme sings a number of pure, unaccompanied joiks. Voice painting, as he describes joiking, he sings of a couple of mountains near his home, a newborn reindeer, a magpie and a bear. Just for a second the performance is on the verge of turning into a persiflage, due to his rendition of country rock. But the encore, in which he pulls all stop in an almost abstract work of art, quickly erases the memory of this straying completely.

Afterwards Wimme shows himself a contented man. 'A good audience; small, but good' he grins widely. Downstairs hundreds of festival-goers continue their ecstatic dance to the beats of Daara J from Dakar, completely oblivious to the fact they just missed what could turn out to be the most exciting world music event of the year.

Ton Maas
(translated by Marijn Ophorst)