Mari Hajem in the Paul McCartney Auditorium, L.I.PA., Liverpool. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

The feeling of goose pimples appearing on your body for no reason at all is not uncommon. Like all natural bodily functions, holding your breath without realising when something unexpected happens before your eyes, the small unseen nervous tick when grace goes out the window, the pleasure received with a huge unnoticed smile when the day is completed by the sense of overwhelming achievement. All are connected to the same route experience, that of understanding something magical has just taken place in your vicinity and that you are richer for the experience.

In Mari Hajem’s showcase appearance in the Paul McCartney Auditorium before she graduates from L.I.P.A. that something special was to be experienced on a grand scale, almost unprecedented and all in front of her peers and friends, the odd interested local fan finding a way to be missed from behind the desk of their employment making up the numbers. For those that made their way to L.I.P.A., for those that found a way to be unseen from the powers that be, to be in Mari Hajem’s company on a sweat inducing April day, was to know that goose bumps and pimples are there to remind us to feel at one with the performance; in Mari Hajem’s company, those bumps manifested themselves, replicated over and over again with sublime adoration.

Joined by a gracious band, including a genuinely talented Martin Borge on saxophone, Mari Hajem offered a set list to the audience that exposed those goose bumps and radical pimples to the delights of Nordic story-telling and clean, unfiltered chronicles of old.

Songs such as Send Me Away, We Will Overcome, War, Wildchild, Wrong Way and Confusion all captured the imagination, all danced to a serenade of Nordic persuasion in their hearts. The small thought of fairy-tale anecdotes being gathered and weaved like gold straw sat tightly in the belly of those watching and each note crystallising like a diamond caught in a delightful truth.

Showcases are meant to be a highlight of a performer’s time at L.I.P.A., for Mari Hajem, this was one stage further, this was sheer delight in every aspect. A continuation of the great work Ms. Hajem has put in, one in which to be gladdened by and let goose pimples wander where they must.

Ian D. Hall