Thursday 02/02/2017
Bello Bar, Dublin

This is Sarah Neufeld’s return to Dublin following her gig with saxophonist and fellow Arcade Fire alumnus Colin Stetson in April 2015. The two were promoting their captivating album Never Were the Way She Was then, but Neufeld is travelling solo this time around, touring last year’s solo album The Ridge. Using just a rack of pedals and her violin, backed by complementary textural and scenic video projections, Neufeld covers a range of material, never leaving one longing for more bodies on stage.

Not reliant on looping like so many solo instrumentalists of the past decade, Neufeld’s ample technique and understated stage presence grow to speak volumes over the course of the gig. The pedal triggering of a bass drum carefully deployed on a handful of tracks, equally enhances the dynamic envelope of the evening’s arc, often providing a four-on-the-floor or downbeat anchor amidst pieces based around syncopated folk-like melodies and extended variations on one or two phrases.

Some of the gig’s most compelling moments come with Neufeld’s vocals. Largely kept to nice contrapuntal bars of soaring oohs and aahs, Neufeld’s move into song would be a welcome one – which isn’t to say her instrumental oeuvre is found lacking. Likewise, the forays into more complex structures in the clever pizzicato development of “The Glow” (like an indie take on a Ravel or Debussy string quartet scherzo) or “A Long Awaited Scar” are completely captivating. Equally, though, it would seem wrong to underestimate the considered repetition of many of the tracks. An avid yogi, one can sense a holistic view of the material. Neufeld is, in these pieces, perhaps continuing John Cage’s stated goal: “to find a means of writing music as strict with respect to my ego as sitting cross-legged.”

Photograph by Gesi Schilling