Nothing in Duisburg stays stuck in place for long. The north-west German city, where the Rhine and Ruhr rivers converge, is home to the world’s largest inland port. That gives it a restless and fast-flowing character that neatly matches bassist Linda May Han Oh’s music. Her band sailed into town on a cold night in mid-November to deliver a shipment of buoyant sonic cargo.
Much of that buoyancy derived from three-part harmonies combining vocals from Oh and Sara Serpa with Will Vinson’s strident alto saxophone. Their voices resounded off the Lutherkirche’s black stone floor and floated up to its high ceiling. Whirlwind percussion from Mark Whitfield Jr. completed the group. Pianist Fabian Almazan was also aboard the band’s European voyage but missed this show due to (sea)sickness. The concert was part of the long-running Intermezzo series.
To cast off, the four-person crew used the rapid current of their leader’s output to merge two tunes together. “Respite”, from the bassist’s sixth album Glass Hours(Biopihilia Records, 2024), surged into a new piece called “Block Party”. Oh was light-footed, dipping her bass like a ballroom dance partner. Her dynamism imbued the written and spontaneous material with irresistible momentum.
Just after the halftime interval, “Halo” gave the audience a chance to more deeply immerse themselves in Serpa’s singing. The Portuguese improviser’s expansive low notes flooded the venue and her crystalline high register sparkled. The song is another bouncy composition that featured a boppy saxophone solo followed by stormy sections from bass and drums.
With their piano-playing shipmate on shore leave, Vinson made two attempts to navigate the keyboard. He even embarked on an extensive solo on “Prayer for Freedom”, where the rhythmic focus contrasted with his more phrase-driven saxophone explorations. Whitfield Jr. added a military undercurrent via his snare. The effervescent drummer earned several of the night’s loudest ovations.
Unusually, this tune used English-language lyrics instead of non-lexical vocals. That gave it the air of a sermon preached at the church’s congregation, while most of the concert felt more like a collective revelation. This was an evening of venturesome music from a band that transported listeners to warmer places than chilly Duisburg—before floating away on the ocean of life, like a ship passing in the night.
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