Tallinn Blog

Last week’s Leigo Festival in South Estonia was somewhat of an exercise in sublime poetry . Not only had they landed a piano and an operasinger on a lake which gave it such a magnificent aura, they also seem to put an entire orchestra on the bigger lake . Now lakes are strange things, their power to reflectiveness is widely known but when it comes down to music there is something out there that seems to resonate on a deeper level . The echo in the water,  is like an answer to the music,  a true participant in the piece as if water tunes into a song and a thousand drops boost it back in the atmosphere with this near organic feel …the body is water afterall. I think this must be where music ends up when it travels past the eardrum, in that great inner lake of our soul . Inside and outside connect uniquely.The atmosphere of the lakelands is quite special aswell there are some big wooden houses, in which one nearly had a tribal feel or distinctively ancient feel, the arcade fire was burning,  it was the only light in there, all you could see was the faces of families gathered around tables …one could only imagine this viking age feeling from a vague old subconscious memory . It felt a bit like a ‘home of pastlife’ tense. More of this paganish stuff when the fires were lit on the lake by guys in little rowingboats which felt a bit like seeing a fairytalebook flapping page by page before your eyes, then later the sailboats set in, to fit with the orchestral ambiance, well i guess they were invited aswell. Choirgirls in traditional dresses came walking round the lake and went up the wooden bridge onto the island, as an aquarel that bursted into a motion picture, surreal beauty. Music ranged from Mozart to Beethoven, one can only imagine the squirls and foxes entranced by these masterpieces of human imagination and craft, i would have loved  to see how it all felt for them, the unseen listeners of this concert the wild animals of Leigofestival . In the end torches were lit on the hill into a pagan circle and people were dancing with firetorches , i must say an impressive feel as the canonshots burst out  in the back . My favorit moment however was a hundred or so Chinese firelampions that were flying up into the sky, second by second they went up higher and smaller untill you could see a swarm of stars buzzing into  nightsky, amazingly enough one could even think of it as a cloud of UFO ’s or  celestial beings …beauty beyond words . The unforgettable day was settled with a mobilephone orchestra , which brought back memories of Steven Spielberg Close encounters of the 3rd kind,  i’m sure the birds at Leigo right now have picked up some of those ringtones and introduced it into their language … Anyway to experience the magic yourself check out www.leigo.ee and some of the pictures i took …

Author & photographer : Thomas Viaene