Erja Lyytinen
9 p.m. Aug. 16, Rainbow Bistro, 76 Murray St. Doors open at 8 p.m.
Tickets: $20 advance, available at ticketweb.ca. $25 at the door.
Finnish guitarist Erja Lyytinen has a weakness for effects pedals, those electronic devices that bend, buckle, twist and otherwise contort the sound of an electric guitar.
Her pedal board is equipped with 20 of the gadgets, a load that adds about 25 kilograms to her baggage allowance, but she wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I loooove pedals,” she confessed in an interview this week. “I like the sounds. I like using the whammy pedal and going crazy and exploring and doing a bit of spaced-out Jimi Hendrix. I also like playing slide and adding some wah and some delay and some modulation effect.
“So yeah. I’m not a traditional blues player but everything is serving the song.”
Finnish guitarist, Erja Lyytinen. Dirk Eidner.
The 43-year-old musician, who’s in Ottawa this week for the first time to play a gig at the Rainbow Bistro, started her music education as a conservatory-trained violinist destined for orchestra life. But with parents who were in a band (dad on guitar and mom on bass), there were plenty of other influences at home. She grew up in Kuopio, a small town in eastern Finland, a country with a surprisingly vibrant blues scene.
“Classical music didn’t interest me as a teenager,” Lyytinen said. “There’s a certain point when you grow up that you want to do something different. Rock music interested me. I liked guitar because I could solo with it, or play rhythm and sing on top of that. I always liked the big harmony sound.”
Her eyes were opened to the possibilities of early American music while watching music videos on VHS at the conservatory. “I saw Ray Charles doing Georgia on my Mind and my skin went to goosebumps,” she recalls. “‘Oh my God, it’s amazing,’ I thought, and I wanted to do the same thing.
“Little by little, I got deeper into the blues and was listening to Koko Taylor and Bonnie Raitt and of course some soul music — Aretha Franklin — and then the guitar stuff started to kick in.”
At 15, she joined her parents’ band, and learned a repertoire of songs that ranged from Finnish dance music to classic rock and pop songs, including a couple of Santana tunes. Around the same time, she was also singing in a Blues Brothers tribute band at school.
She continued to study music, too, attending music schools in Denmark, Los Angeles and Sweden, finally earning a master’s degree in Helsinki, a distinction that prompts her band members to tease her for being one of the most educated blues musicians in Europe.
Lyytinen released three albums on the Finnish roots label, Bluelight Records, in the early 2000s before signing to Germany’s Ruf Records and then launching her own label, Tuohi Records. Her latest recording, Another World, came out this year, featuring a full slate of original songs and guest spots by slide master Sonny Landreth and former Michael Jackson guitarist Jennifer Batten.
The album marks a new chapter for the now-separated mom of five-year-old twin boys.
“It’s an empowering album,” Lyytinen explains. “The previous album was called Stolen Heart, and it was written during the breakup time. There were dark times and sadness. But now it’s like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Emotionally, it’s like searching for something new and you find yourself, and you’re open to new things and happy about what you have.”
There’s also growth in the music, with elements of jazz and progressive rock enhancing her unique, blues-based style.
“I feel that musically I have also taken steps towards something new and that’s very fascinating. As a guitar player, I’m not restricting myself. I just do what I hear and it feels very satisfying,” she said.
Lyytinen, who was declared 2017’s best guitarist in the European Blues Awards, has had some inspiring moments in recent years, including a guest appearance with Carlos Santana in front of 20,000 people in Helsinki last summer, where she held her own against the master of psychedelic Latin-tinged rock. Video from that day shows her grinning from ear to ear as she trades licks with Carlos.
“It was amazing. What an experience,” she gushes. “Sometimes I think, ‘Did this really happen?’ but it’s online on YouTube. I can go and have a look anytime.”
She’s also shared stages with blues greats like Joe Bonamassa and John Mayall, and this year opened for superstar crooner Tom Jones. Another highlight of 2019 was playing alongside Elwood Blues (a.k.a. Dan Aykroyd) during the Downchild Blues Band’s 50th anniversary gig in Toronto in June.
Recalling her high-school band experience playing Blues Brothers songs, she describes it as a “full-circle moment” that gives her hope for an equally long career.
“I hope I’m able to do good concerts for the next 40 years,” she says. “That’s what I’m aiming for.”
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