- Cloud Valley Music website -
- Andrew Cronshaw website -
- Andrew Cronshaw MySpace -

- Back to Reviews Introduction page -

Written in fRoots issue 347, 2012


MARIA KALANIEMI & TIMO ALAKOTILA
Åkerö
Åkerö ÅKERÖCD011

The breath-poised, finely-integrated elegance of Kalaniemi’s chromatic button-accordion and Alakotila’s piano unite again in a rich flow of compositions, mainly their own, some traditional, that draw on the formality of Finnish traditional dance music, the emotionality of tango, the intricacy of Parisian musette and a distinctive cascading, rolling, surging, wind-blown strain of melodious inventiveness that these two have in effect pioneered, individually and together, and has now become a strong aspect of Finnish musical character.
     Maria sings, calmly and mellifluously, on one track, and for the scampering , exuberant polka-sourced Viola they’re joined by trumpet, trombone, alto sax and drums as a full band like a punchier version of Maria’s large-ish brass-endowed Aldargaz of the 1990s.
     Currently high in the European world music airplay chart, this album is arguably the most well-shaped and complete in Kalaniemi and Alakotila’s twenty years of duo projects.

www.mariakalaniemi.com


© 2012 Andrew Cronshaw
 

You're welcome to quote from reviews on this site, but please credit the writer and fRoots.

Links:
fRoots - The feature and review-packed UK-based monthly world roots music magazine in which these reviews were published, and by whose permission they're reproduced here.

It's not practical to give, and keep up to date, current contact details and sales sources for all the artists and labels in these reviews, but try Googling for them, and where possible buy direct from the artists.
CDRoots.com in the USA, run by Cliff Furnald, is a reliable and independent online retail source, with reviews, of many of the CDs in these reviews; it's connected to his excellent online magazine Rootsworld.com 

For more reviews click on the regions below

NORDIC        BALTIC        IBERIA (& islands)   

CENTRAL & EASTERN EUROPE, & CAUCASUS   

OTHER EUROPEAN        AMERICAS        OTHER, AND WORLD IN GENERAL

- Back to Reviews Introduction page -