Västerbottens Folkblad 110414
By: ELIN LARSSON
MUSIC
Helen Sjöholm
Aula Nordica, Umeå
++++
Attendance: Approximately 600 people
Length: Approximately two hours
Best: Så vände vinden (from Aniara) and Ett slag för dig
Worst: It’s not okay to talk on the phone when you are in a concert hall. Even if it happens to be your wife who has brought you there…
Helen Sjöholm visited Aula Nordica with a concert that started a bit too gloomy, but became better and better and towards the end lifted the roof! It was a somewhat sprawling concert that Helen Sjöholm gave as a guest in Umeå on Wednesday evening, but the sprawling was nothing that bothered. Because it was a concert that grew all the way to the ending where it lifted the roof. With the lifting roof all our thoughts on work and daily lives flew away and left us totally open for Sjöholm’s singing which walked straight into our hearts and gave us goosebumps on our arms and legs.
A big thanks should also be given for the perfectly balanced sound relationships between song and music which complemented each other in a perfect way. Something that may seem obvious but very rarely succeeds with the same verve as now. Also the relationship between the amount of music and singing was exemplary, and with musicians of the class who shared the stage with Sjöholm this night, there are never too many solos. Instead it becomes something you are looking forward to and are grateful to be able to hear a lot of.
In particular, André Ferrari’s drum solo, which was spread in the end of the concert, deserves to be highlighted as one of the best we ever heard. But also that an entirely instrumental song like Jojje Wadenius “Kärleksmorgon” (Morning Love) is allowed to take place in the concert and it doesn´t feel like “too much”, which explains a lot. Sjöholm herself doesn´t make us disappointed tonight either. With her incredible charisma and her amazing voice, she brings us on a musical journey we will never forget. Sjöholm straight into your heart.