Review: WE ARE WATER: A NORTHEAST CELEBRATION at Merrill Auditorium,

We’ve all needed a bit more water this year to ease the drought.  But Yo-Yo Ma and friends sought to address the ways of water in a broader context in a just shy of two-hour performance on October 20th in Portland.

“We Are Water: A Northeast Celebration” brought the acclaimed cellist and a host of indigenous artists from the Wabanaki Confederacy to Merrill Auditorium under the auspices of Portland Ovations for an evening of instrumental music, rich vocal harmonies, spirited storytelling, dance, and more.  The intent was, for the most part, to be gently instructive and equally celebratory and forward-looking.  In a nutshell, the program urged everyone to give greater respect to the rich positivity that can flow within a shared environment.

Ma gave a taste of music by an indigenous composer in his encore to a performance with the Portland Symphony Orchestra last year.   An arrangement of a Mi’kmaw song by Jeremy Dutcher suggested cultural roots and branches for an appreciative crowd who were there mostly to hear a master of classical music. 

Dutcher took a central role in “We Are Water,” as musician, storyteller, and co-master of ceremonies with Chris Newell, the latter years ago having drawn Ma into the cultural connections between nature, art, and human experience that had long been a part of Wabanaki teachings.

Aquatic themes were presented through stories involving the personal experiences of several performers as well as mythical tales augmented by visual projections at the rear of the stage and the surprise appearance of some rather imposing puppet figures (courtesy of Nance Parker).  Threats to the environment were emphasized in several musical performances and spoken moments as when Icelandic poet Andri Snær Magnason recounted the accelerating disappearance of glaciers.

Local jazz and folk music favorite Mali Obomsawin (upright bass, acoustic guitar, and voice), who is not averse to allowing a bit of ancestral anger show through in her performances, joined Dutcher, Ma, and Ida Mae Specker (fiddle, voice) on numbers that stretched from traditional to quite modern sounds.  Other participants often added support from hand-held percussion instruments.   Elder Maggie Paul evoked tradition in words and song.  Vocalist Lauren Stevens lifted a bilingual “Amazing Grace” to the far reaches of the sold-out Auditorium and Roger Paul told prose/poetic stories.

Of course, Ma broke into a little Bach at one point, if only to show how everything musically and otherwise flows through a grateful recognition expressed through art.  Creativity, he earlier had said, is essential to maintaining a sense of dignity.

Photo courtesy of Portland Ovations.