Music meets pictures

Tango Trousers is a meeting between accordion queen Maria Kalaniemi and photographer-video artist Elina Brotherus. Brotherus’s video art is unique, and her decision to place herself at the centre of almost all of it is interesting. On screen, she manages to be both neutral and expressive at the same time. Accordionist Maria Kalaniemi is a master in her field, full of elegant emotion as always, and her duo work with younger colleague Eero Grundström (harmonium), known from the harmonica band Sväng, feels very fruitful.

Each piece manages to be totally different from the others. After a calm introduction, with a lot of beautiful Finnish nature sounds, we dive into more dramatic and surprising moods (the intriguing “Marcello’s Theme”) as well as spookiness, fun and avant-garde. The music feels fresh and new; “Elina’s Theme” is the piece most recognisably in Kalaniemi’s style. One of my favourites is “Silent Lake”, with the most perfect timing when the artist starts swimming. The only thing I’m not that pleased with is the title, which doesn’t feel that suitable for the final artwork.