In The Labyrinth Peter Lindahl

MY STORY IN BRIEF

By Peter Lindahl

I was born in Stockholm, Sweden in 1951. My father worked as a teacher and later on, for a couple of years, as a constructor of renaissance instruments while my mother made her living from working as a secretary at the daily news. In the fifties and sixties I got two brothers, one for each decade. The family used to spend a lot of time by the Baltic sea, visiting various Islands of the archipelago during the summer months and when I was very young I stayed at my grandparents´ summer cottage on an Island facing open waters. I´ve always lived in close proximity to one ocean or the other even though our residence here in the Stockholm suburb of Bromma is nearer to the lake Mälaren than to the Baltic.

When I was nine we moved to West Australia and we returned to Sweden when I was at the age of fifteen to avoid my being drafted for the Vietnam war, which Australia b Me in the north of Sweden

y the year of 1966 had become increasingly involved in. So with all this moving about I became what you could call a bit of a wanderer and thus keen on travelling and seeing new and exotic places around the world. This in turn has suposedly rubbed off on my music or at least parts of it, especially on the songs of In the labyrinth. However, I do also separately work with more conventional types of expression meaning regular pop and rock as well as with inclinations toward folk music and other various styles.

On Tenerife

I guess my interest for the Orient and the cultures that go with it began with my rendezvous with Egypt when we entered the Suez canal on our way down to Australia. This was in 1961 and the world was a much more exotic place. So you can imagine all the inspiration I got from this journey, something that will probably last me a life time. Also the wonders of being a new-born fair din cum Aussie in the years to come with residencies both around the WA capital Perth, in the outback as well as by the Indian ocean loaded me with creativity for many years ahead and helped to raise my spirit.

It was later when we returned to Sweden that I got a guitar from my grandmother and started exploring that wonderful world of music.

By 1968 I was laying down one to three tracks a day on the simple recording equipment I had in those days and I regret to say my parents must have had a lot of patience with me, for better or for worse! It was in the early seventies that I think I started to develop a bit. I eventually met up with a lot of different musicians along the way and found a great pleasure in co- operating with others. Despite this I am however a bit addicted to the "do it yourself" motto and have always found immense joy in layering on instrument by instrument as well as voices on my recordings, performing this task mostly on my own. However, when this is sparsely combined with interaction between other musicians and myself things can really happen, at least from what I´ve experienced at several occasions in my life so far.

Coiron

Coiron With me to the left

One group which I performed with for the latter most part of the seventies was Coiron. We played Latin American "altiplano" music with a combination of both traditional and classical instruments. After a few years when it had turned into a more or less conventional ethnic band, I quit and went on to eventually form Aladdin's lantern (later to become In the labyrinth) and Ljungeld. This was a trio which consisted of my old friends Stefan Ottman, Håkan Stockhaus and myself.

Ljungeld
From left to right: Stefan Ottman on guitar,
me on the flute and Håkan Stockhaus
playing the mandolin

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my past!

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Down Under!

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