| Summary: | Olivier Ker Ourio is a born storyteller. He knows how to express in words and music his love for Reunion Island as well as his ambition to introduce the musicians of Orkes Peï to the metropolitan public as ambassadors of Reunion Island culture. It is because an ancestor born in Lorient embarked on a ship in 1728 to go to Bourbon Island, now known as Reunion Island, that the family saga of the Ker Ourio has been Réunionese for eleven generations. Although he was born in Paris, it was in 1972, when he was only eight years old, that the harmonica player felt the shock of nature and the beginning of his love for the island when his family returned to live there. It was this love that pushed him to form the Orkes Pei. In his words: "At age fifty, I wanted to start an orchestra with musicians from the island, because they speak the language of the country. By choosing a rhythmic composed of the wonderful musicians that are the bassist Jamy Pedro, the drummer Emmanuel Félicité, and the percussionist Nicolas Moucazambo, I was sure to hear the music as it is being played there, with a flow, a rhythmical placement, accents that make us have the sound and groove that make the place go. Then, we can bring harmonies that come from jazz." For this, he calls on Thürin Mitchell, a Quebec jazz pianist who has lived in Reunion Island for several years. He also invites his long-time collaborator, Sylvain Luc, for a duo that's nearly Brazilian in tenderness and sensuality, but the revelation is the haunting song by Carlo de Sacco--almost a slam in Creole --that gives goose bumps. Captured with a rare intelligence by director Gilles Le Mao, the documentary exudes the love of life. Philippe Lesage.
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