On Friday evening, a magical musical moment will arise in the beautifulJacobikerk that the visitor will never forget – it will turn out to be one ofmany. The Japanese singer and keyboardist Hinako Omori plays heavenly melodieshere and lets a choir of chirping birds sing along far in the background. Sheherself lays sonorous, unintelligible vocal lines over her calming soundworld, from which all unrest or excitement is banned.
And what a visual spectacle is now emerging in the church. Soft green dropspass against the columns and groin vaults high above the audience, to calm themood even further. And behind Omori, five dark blue beams of light pierce thenave of the church. Where the six halls of TivoliVredenburg in Utrecht formthe hectic heart of the festival, you slowly fall into a trance here, farremoved from it.
Mimi Parker
This year, the American band Low would not only perform but also be a curatorat Le Guess Who. But a few weeks ago they had to cancel; drummer Mimi Parkerwas seriously ill. She passed away from cancer last Sunday; a great loss forthe festival and for rock music in general. The band Divide and Dissolvededicated their show to her on Thursday.
And a day later it hits again, with two breathtakingly beautiful Spanishconcerts in the same church. Singer Lole Montoya, a seventies flamenco singerwith undiluted hippie ideals, sings fragile but moving next to a searching andprofound guitar. Montoya’s voice still has that youthful innocence, especiallywhen it comes to her old flamenco hit Todo es de Color sings with a chanson-like melancholy.
After her, the great Estrella Morente takes the stage, with the AmsterdamAndalusian Orchestra. The singer, in the company of two guitarists and threefemale singers, lets her plaintive flamenco be performed next to swirlingviolins, the ud and the spiritual Arabic vocals of the orchestra leader AhmedEl Maai. Goosebumps up to the ears, especially when Morente strides slowly andsinging out of the church after a thunderous ovation on the arm of El Maai.The audience follows in a procession and is almost moved to tears – a miraclehas taken place in the Jacobikerk.
Dry cleaning.Figurine Jelmer de Haas
The Utrecht based Le Guess Who has grown in recent years into one of the mostinnovative festivals in the world and is therefore also visited by a veryinternational audience. The four-day festival no longer wants major headlinersin the program to sell tickets. And it no longer wants to program by genre inorder to attract an unambiguous audience. Le Guess Who wants to be more of aquest and lets artists from all corners of the world come together toexperience a kind of joint music journey. The public knows and appreciates it:Le Guess Who was sold out this year.
Although there are also new bands that can also be seen at regular festivals.On Friday, the Ronda in TivoliVredenburg, with a capacity of two thousandvisitors, the largest room at the festival, will be full for the British post-punk band Dry Cleaning. The band with the beautifully hypothermic monotonevoice of Florence Shaw and icy guitar lines exorcises for an hour that part ofthe audience that also wants to hear a more familiar sound. And then theAmerican trio Clipping explodes the same room with an insanely beautiful hip-hop show, and the very sharp raps of Daveed Diggs.
Le Guess Who likes to excite by presenting the most extreme sounds. But nomatter how deafening the Norwegian trio Supersilent was on Sunday: the rootsof their hard music, with a striking role for Arve Henriksen’s piercingtrumpet, lie in the avant-garde and jazz. An eye for tradition, makingconnections between old and new music by programming folk and other folk musicfrom all over the world: that is what makes the festival unique.
Idris Ackamoor & The PyramidsFigurine Jelmer de Haas
The audience understands that and is completely silent to experience theTurkish folk of Derya Yildirim in Ekko. To then end up in the Grote Zaal withan entertaining show by the American orchestra leader and saxophonist IdrisAckamoor. Ackamoor, who is celebrating the 50th anniversary of his orchestraThe Pyramids, does not set the bar too high in the packed Great Hall. Fromafrobeat to free jazz via a piece of R&B à la Sun Ra: assisted by two extrahorn players and a string quartet, it goes off smoothly. Nice to watch, butgreat moments of elevation are missing.
There are plenty of them in the half hour that the American gospel familyBrown will perform in the Janskerk on Friday. The Browns began fifty years agoas The Staples Jr. Singers, out of respect for The Staple Singers. The voicesof Edward and Anna and the guitar of brother ARC almost make you rise fromyour chair with euphoria. Before you know it, wave and sing along. Ecstasy ina church, that’s gospel, and that’s it here.
The Staples Jr. SingersFigurine Jelmer de Haas
The contrast could not be greater with another highlight, the solo performanceon Sunday by the South African pianist Abdullah Ibrahim (88). He stringstogether the most beautiful pieces of improvisation, motifs and melodies foran hour without interruption. And after the applause he sings two more hymnswhile standing and you walk out of the hall for the umpteenth time thisfestival with the feeling that you have experienced something incomparable.