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Concert Sat Feb 15 2014
Linnea Olsson with Ane Brun @ Schubas 2/15/14
Linnea Olsson is remarkable. With just one album release so far, Ah, she already shows promise and a sense of accomplishment. Live, she lived up to the hopes of the sold out audience. Those there to see Ane Brun were quite pleasantly surprised with Olsson's talent as a songwriter. Those there to see Olsson primarily were not disappointed.
Olsson's playing was both adept and sincere. She has a way of coordinating all of her various song elements on cello so that it conjures up the sense of a lush Brahm's symphony. Her playing was not just technically realized but also quite emotionally realized too. All the while, she was very sweet and modest, thanking the crowd and giving hints of what some of her songs are about. It was no surprise that the 14 copies of her album she had left to sell were all gone rather quickly after she finished playing.
The only disappointment was that with such a tightness and limited time span for both musicians, Olsson was only able to play her own pieces for about 35 minutes before playing backup to Brun. Of course, she added very lovely cello accompaniment to Brun's pieces as well as backup vocals for some of the key songs, and it was nice to see Olsson and Brun have such a great presence together. Brun acknowledged Olsson's contributions several times and encouraged her fans to buy Olsson's record. One could clearly sense that Olsson has the ability to become an even greater musician and in time easily headline venues across North America herself. Let's hope she has a long career ahead of her!
Read the interview I did with Linnea Olsson recently here.
Ane Brun:
