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EESTI ELU reedel, 22. oktoobril 2021 — Friday, October 22, 2021
Alternative/R&B singer-songwriter Estyr depicts “in-between” spaces in her upcoming Estonian Music Week concert Vincent Teetsov If you haven’t yet bought your tickets or bookmarked Estonian Music Week’s You Tube channel (www.youtube. com/channel/UCwBb2dRot24QX5Cbmc_zDg) or Face book page (www.facebook. com/EstonianMusicWeek) for the concerts on Friday October 22nd and Saturday October 23rd, then you’ll definitely want to do so now! On Friday the 22nd – the first night of the festival – Estyr will be sharing the stage Estyr. Photo: Serville Poblete of Toronto’s Paradise Theatre with Kaili Kinnon, in addition does going against expectato a live-streamed performance tions play a role in your comfrom Rita Ray in Tallinn, positions? Estonia. For me, I arrange songs not You may know Estyr from to go against expectations but to the alt-pop band Tiger Balme, be honest about the feeling I’m featuring a quintet of vibra expressing. “High on a Feeling” phone, harp, drums, bass, and is about love that floats into guitar. Alternatively, you may your life and creates a big be familiar with her perfor chaotic disruption in the best mances as a solo artist, for way! which she has headlined with In the past, you’ve spoken Kaili Kinnon in the past. Across eloquently about your Finnish, these projects and Toronto’s Singaporean, and Chinese music scene, she has presented background. You’ve performed poignant musical vignettes in Finland and speak Finnish. through her singing and acous Do you find connecting to tic guitar playing. your family heritage to be a Before her concert, read more vital part of your career as an about the story behind the artist? songs: It’s essential! As a multi One of the themes you racial person, it has taken me a describe as being part of your long time to collect the threads music is the concept of of my heritage. Through my art, liminality. You also mention I’m able to knit these threads Toronto’s suburbs. What in together and discover a way particular about this city and forward. liminal spaces are you seeking What was the best part of to capture with your songplaying shows in Finland? writing? Experiencing a Finnish crowd My mother lived in Finland for over 20 years, and my dad was so interesting! Whenever I grew up in Singapore for the make art, I’m aware of a same length of time. As their Finland of the past: the Finland daughter, I always felt the which raised my mom. It felt presence of what they left refreshing to give a Finnish behind. It felt as if we were audience the songs I had been always “in-between” the past writing, and it felt like a way to and the future. To me, the connect the present to the past. suburbs represent this in- You previously performed between space as well: an area with fellow Estonian Music that many folks don’t have deep Week artist Kaili Kinnon at roots in; a place where they the Drake Underground in hope to build and experience a early 2020. Have you known each other for a long time? lasting sense of home. Listening to your 2019 I met the one-in-a-million single “Human Alchemy”, it Kaili Kinnon in a gospel choir seems that you have long been class at York University. We’ve a proponent for a measured been friends since as we share a building-up of dynamics in a deep love for songwriting and song. In music, would you of course, European heritage. agree with a statement like What are you most excited “quiet is the new loud”? about in the lead-up to perWhen I went to Finland and forming your songs at night experienced Lutheran religious one of Estonian Music Week services, I felt how deeply my on October 22nd? music is influenced by a The pandemic has changed Finnish sensibility of writing me as an artist and I’m excited haunting melodies and honour and proud to share what I’ve ing silence. Finns aren’t afraid been working on with this of using silence to make a state community. ment. Perhaps I would say ••• “quiet is the old loud” haha. You can get tickets for all At the same time, in songs like your recent single “High Estonian Music Concerts at on a Feeling”, you contrast estonianmusicweek.ca. mid-tempo tranquility with a (This interview has been edited volatile final chorus. How and condensed.)
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What’s propelling Finswimming in Estonia’s athletic scene? Vincent Teetsov “In every pool in the world, at least two Estonians can be found.” Or was it every port? Ernest Hemingway’s quote aside, it is true that Estonians are adept at meeting or surpassing their proportional representation in international sports. This was seen in 2018 during the 20th Finswimming World Championships in Belgrade, Serbia. During the women’s 400 metre immersion finswim ming event, two Estonians were in the water: Anastassia-Anna Kunitsõna and Jelena Smirnova. Before the race, swimmers secured their monofins (a single fin that attaches both of their feet together) and their cylin ders of compressed atmospheric air. These cylinders are held right in front of each swimmer instead of breathing in above the surface of the water. Furthermore, as was explained by the commentator, “the use of oxygen-enriched mixtures is completely forbidden...” At that point, they sat up on the starting blocks, clamping down on their breathing appara tuses, ready to jump in as soon as the starting beep sounded. The eight swimmers leaped for ward cleanly into the water in unison, moving immediately into a fluid dolphin kick with slightly bent knees and unifor mity of movement. It’s essential that the push and pull of their fins is strong and even, as arms are not used in immersion finswimming. Once their heads reached the turning T at the end of the first length, each swimmer went into a modified flip-turn: flipping head-first with the oxygen canister tucked into their core, whipping their legs over to meet the turning target on the pool wall, before rotating and pushing off into the next length of the pool. The first lap of 50 metres (international finswimming competitions always use Olym pic-sized pools) was completed
The 2019 Estonian Finswimming Championships. Photo: finswimmer.com
in 20.22 seconds by Yi Ting Sun from China. The swimmers were very quickly back to a full extension of the body and legs. All along, you could see precisely spaced exhale bubbles. After eight laps, Yi Ting Sun came out in first place with a time of two minutes and 59.24 seconds, while Kunitsõna and Smirnova tied in sixth with an identical overall time of three minutes and 8.13 seconds Similar events include sur face finswimming with a snorkel and bi-fins (the standard pair of two, with feet detached) in a front crawl stroke, or single laps completed with just one full breath and a monofin. These events are governed by the Con fédération Mondiale des Ac ti vités Subaquatiques (CMAS, or World Underwater Federation). Long before this sport existed, the International Swimming Hall of Fame notes that “Polynesian swimmers used hard palm [leaves] tied to their feet as swimming aids.” Benjamin Franklin is said to have invented the very first hand-powered fins. In 1876, R.H.W. Dunlop patented foot “plates” made out of wood. In the 1930s, Louis de Corlieu from France and Owen Chur chill from the United States both created more flexible de signs. De Corlieu then created a monofin in 1937, but it was only after the design was adjusted by several other divers and swimmers that the monofin gained notoriety for its speed in competitions in the early 1970s. The choice of material also changed from titanium and canvas to fibreglass, as de veloped in Russia. Competition
rules still had to catch up to the technique of monofins, but eventually they became pre ferred over bi-fins. Speaking about Estonia’s connection to finswimming, the organizers of the 2020/2021 CMAS World Championships in Tomsk, Russia said, “Estonia has been strong in underwater orienteering since the end of 1950s in [the USSR] and worldwide. Until the collapse of the USSR it was the main un derwater sport for the country.” With the current era in mind, they added, “[Estonian] sport divers almost never miss the world and European champion ships and get on the podium.” In a 2012 interview with Finswimmer Magazine, Jelena Smirnova noted how Estonia had “six clubs with about 400 swimmers,” which includes Spordiklubi Fortuna in Tallinn and Maardu Finswimming Club, outside of Tallinn, where she coaches. Smirnova herself was Euro pean champion in 2012 and 2014, bronze medallist in the World Championships of 2013, European silver medallist in 2016, and a European record holder. Her strongest perfor mances are in longer-distance 400 or 800 metre immersion finswimming events. Now, she pays it forward to her local community of young finswimmers. Smirnova is one of three coaches at Maardu Finswimming Club, along with Maria Zavjalova and Maksim Merkuri, who himself trained Smirnova. Across age groups, from three months old into the teenage years, youth are en (Continued on page 10)
