Linsey Pollak "Mrs Curly and The Norwegian Smoking Pipe"

If you attended any of the Bellingen Global Carnivals of yesteryear, chances are that you saw or heard Linsey Pollak in one of his many musical incarnations. You might have seen him alongside Ross Daly as one part of  "Slivanje" or as one half of his duo with Tunji Beier "DVA" . It might have been his "Frog Music" interactive performance piece in which the audience themselves could randomly trigger the tuned sounds of endangered frogs with water guns.

Or, like me, you might have been awestruck by "Knocking on Kevin's Door" in which Kevin the Roadie (Linsey, of course) wandered around the stage creating surprisingly wonderful, soaring sounds from mike stands and gaffer tape which were then put through digital loops. Another memorable show, "The Art of Food", featured Linsey as a French Chef, making wind and percussion instruments from fruit and veggies, his use of a drill to fashion a clarinet from a carrot causing a buzz around the festival.

From 1990 to 2014 Linsey toured the world with these solo shows featuring the live looping of music made from all manner of found object instruments, from feather dusters to watering cans, hose pipes to rubber gloves, from bicycles to the kitchen sink (literally). But for forty years now, away from the stage and back in his workshop, he has been honing his skills as an instrument maker. Inspired by the Hungarian tarogato he has made and perfected the saxillo, a conical bore wooden soprano saxophone. He has also invented and crafted "Crow", a narrow bore bass clarinet made from an Australian Rainforest timber called "Crow's Ash", an instrument which has an other-wordly depth to it's sound. Then there's the clarini - a keyless clarinet made from the Australian timber Gidgee, which lends itself well to Linsey's more ethereal pieces.

The tours de force in Pollak's armoury of instruments would have to be "Bella", "Donna" and "Mrs Curly", the glass instruments he has created in collaboration with the extremely talented glass artisan Arnie Fuchs. Looking like spiral equipment made for scientific experiments, in Linsey's hands these narrow bore glass inventions become contrabass clarinets of the deepest profundity imaginable.

This CD and accompanying 40 page book are a joyful (and educational) combination of all of the fabulous creations Linsey has come up with over the years. A fruition, if you like. It is evident that a lot of love has gone into this self-published, crowd-funded project. The 16 tracks of music are all seriously good. The recordings are top quality. And the musicians who make up the ensemble are seriously talented. On "plucked strings" is Philip Griffin (his bass playing is sumptuous); Louise King contributes some cello-playing that takes Linsey's music to a whole new level; and, as always, Tunji Beier plays his South Indian and Sri Lankan percussion to perfection, and surprises with his sensitive dexterity on a full drum set. His cymbal solo in "On Alert" is simply exquisite.

This last piece features the Norwegian Smoking Pipe of the title, the most recent addition to Linsey's family of instruments. Some long-lost Norwegian cousins recently caught up with Linsey and presented him with the ornate smoking pipe that once belonged to their and his great great grandfather, knowing full well what would be it's fate. He widened the 4mm bore to 8mm, thereby removing many years of nicotine tar. With a soprano sax mouthpiece and some perfectly placed holes (Pollak only had one go at getting it right!) it is now a thing of sublime musical beauty.

If you would like to make contact with Linsey about this fabulous new release, his website is the place to go: www.linseypollak.com - However, a word of warning - make sure you go there when you have plenty of time as you might get lost in the maze of Pollak's zany creativity and totally caught up in the playfulness of it all.