Singer-songwriter, Louis Jucker, from La Chaux-de-Fonds has created a completely independent world in recent years. With his sparingly intoned, experimental songs, he creates a soothing anachronism in the midst of a hectic everyday life. The «Get Going!» grant is now supporting him in a multi-year project that will culminate in the construction of a recording machine that is supposed to work without the use of electricity. The aim is to respond to the state of the world by creating local and simple ways of producing music. louisjucker.ch
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start. At monthly intervals, we present the eight recipients of the 2022 «Get Going!» grant individually.
The Ticino harp virtuoso has made a name for herself with her cross-genre compositions, in which she constantly explores and expands the possibilities of her instrument. The «Get Going!» grant now allows her to research the development of an additional element for the acoustic harp. This extension aims to overcome the limits of the tonal spectrum of the harp. This creates new scope for expanding the harp in order to create a new hybrid instrumental language. ketyfusco.com
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start. At monthly intervals, we present the eight recipients of the 2022 «Get Going!» grant individually.
Lucia Cadotsch / LIUN + The Science Fiction Orchestra “After concentrating the last few years with my trio “Speak Low” – together with bassist Petter Eldh and saxophonist Otis Sandsjö – mainly on working in chamber music instrumentation, the need has grown in me to explore the sonic and compositional possibilities of a large ensemble. I am therefore very much looking forward to composing and recording new pieces for an orchestral album next year, together with producer Wanja Slavin. In addition, I hope that a new ensemble will emerge from the collaboration with the many exciting artists, which will continuously develop, cross-fertilise and perform live.” luciacadotsch.com youtube.com/watch?v=OQ7ETYq0Ksg
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LUCIA CADOTSCH
30.12.2022
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start.
Bern resident Hasan Nakhleh works with his brother Rami in the duo TootArd on a symbiosis between global dance music and Arab cultural heritage. Thanks to the «Get Going!» grant, he now finds the time and space to take an even more detailed look at this balance between East and West.
In our interview, Hasan Nakhleh keeps raving about Bern. About its beauty and the tranquillity, he found here. Nakhleh has been living in the Swiss capital since 2014 – love brought him to Switzerland. He has had a Swiss passport since 2021. This is not insignificant for someone who grew up in the Golan Heights. The Arab population is de facto stateless in the territory annexed by Israel. “Golan,” says Nakhleh, “is a homeland that is not a true home, whereas Bern is a place that is far from my own homeland.”
The 35-year-old draws the creativity for his music from this field of tension. Together with his brother Rami, he has been making music since childhood. When they formed a band to perform in local clubs, they called themselves TootArd. Hasan laughs because the name means “strawberry” in English. “We did not want to be suspected of spreading political messages in our texts, and strawberry seemed like a harmless enough name to us.”
The duo has already released three albums. They called their second work “Laisser passer” – that is the name of the document they received instead of a passport. “This allowed us to leave the Golan Heights, but if we wanted to travel abroad, this always required tedious visa applications.”
As a Swiss national, he can now travel wherever he wants without any difficulty. While Hasan appreciates Bern’s tranquillity for his work, his brother Rami has remained in his home village. “This does not prevent us from working together,” he explains. While Rami is responsible for the beats, Hasan is responsible for the rest – including the vocals. And as “Migrant Birds”, the title of their most recent album, suggests they want to spread their infectious dance music with hypnotic beats, Arabic and oriental-inspired melodies and socially critical texts with a poetic touch like migratory birds around the world.
“I now want to perfect what we started on our last album,” he explains, by which he means he wants to create global dance music that is understood everywhere, but at the same time does not deny its origins. Thanks to the «Get Going!» grant, he now has the time, among other things, to retune his analogue and digital synthesisers so that he can play quarter tones with them. “These quarter tones are an integral part of the Arab tone system, but they are not playable on keyboard instruments. I therefore use tuning boxes that communicate with the instruments via “MIDI”. This allows the mood on the keyboards to be changed.” As a composer, on the other hand, the challenge is to strike the right balance between East and West, between his cultural home and the world in which he now lives and works.
Hasan Nakhleh describes the experiences he and his brother regularly have at the concerts, whether in Switzerland, London, Toronto, Tokyo or Cairo. “At our performances, people of the most varied origins come together to dance. This promotes tolerance because music generally has a unifying effect. In addition, we also thus help to reduce certain stereotypes, because we integrate Arab cultural heritage into contemporary musical robes.”
The «Get Going!» grant is “the best form of support you can get,” he emphasises. “If you enable artists to have financial freedom, there will always be a result.” He also considers the fact that no concrete result is associated with the grant as a source of motivation: “There is no external compulsion. So I don’t have to, which gives rise to the question: Do I want that?” With «Get Going!» – he emphasizes at the end of the interview – he is trusted as an artist. That is something utterly extraordinary. “This aspect alone gives me enough of a sense of personal duty to create something good.”
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start. At monthly intervals, we present the eight recipients of the 2022 «Get Going!» grant individually.
Simone Felber, a singer, is working on numerous projects to make Swiss folk music suitable for the modern era. And with the «Get Going!» grant she has been awarded, she now also wants to revive the dance of the dead.
She started making folk music at a late stage – actually only during her studies at the Lucerne School of Music. There Simone Felber met Schwyzerörgeli (a type of diatonic button accordion invented in the Canton of Schwyz) player, Adrian Würsch, and the double base player, Pirmin Huber, with whom she now forms the trio “Simone Felbers iheimisch”. Previously, she was mainly active in classical music; her participation in the choir molto cantabile, which is dedicated to contemporary music, influenced her greatly. As a city-dwelling nature lover, the Lucerne native discovered something in folk music that met her very personal needs: “We always strive for perfection in music. However, whereas classical music is about the perfect performance of sound, jazz and folk music offer you the opportunity to find your very own sound.”
This personal sound manifests itself not only in the trio “Simone Felbers iheimisch” but also in numerous other projects, such as in the women’s quartet “famm” or as the director of the choir “Echo vom Eierstock”. The trained mezzo-soprano is therefore not only concerned with finding a completely contemporary expression in non-verbal singing and yodelling, but, as a 30-year-old, also with expressing a stance which appeals to her generation. Modern Switzerland is multicultural, urban and faces societal, social and political problems, while at the same time nature is rising up and challenging the places of popular origin where climate change is concerned. Felber wants her music to reflect all of the above, whereas she frequently suspects folk music of being too far removed from everyday life. “Folk music sometimes reminds me of a glossy brochure,” she says before adding: “I, on the other hand, prefer recycled paper.”
She has joined forces with the jazz pianist, Lukas Gernet, for her latest project entitled “hedi drescht”. This involves jointly looking into the question of “What is home?” and setting their pictures to music with a stylistic kaleidoscope of classical, yodelling and jazz. On stage, the collection of songs “äinigermasse dehäi” becomes an interdisciplinary audiovisual performance in collaboration with the theatre collective Fetter Vetter & Oma Hommage, the video artist, Jules Claude Gisler, and the theatre-maker, Stephan Q. Eberhard.
For her «Get Going!» project, Felber is now going one step further by addressing the topic of death, which she has recently faced first hand due to the loss of some loved ones. She is particularly fascinated by the act of the dance of the dead. But who dances this dance? In folk music, the “Tänzli” exists: do the living dance there without sparing a thought for death or in order to celebrate life before death? Or is it death that dances, as on the baroque motifs that can be admired on the Spreuer Bridge in Felber’s hometown of Lucerne? Or even someone who is doomed to die and dances on their journey to another world? Felber has been exploring these questions for a long time. “In many cultures, life and death is a circular process, while we consider our existence to be a linear event,” she explains. “I want the crippling feeling which comes over us in the face of death to be transformed into an emotion that can lead us out again.”
She does not yet know in detail what this will look like in the end. “However, I rather imagine an audiovisual installation that allows people to be confronted with the topic very personally in an intimate setting.” The «Get Going!» grant – she emphasises – gives her the freedom and certainty that she can now make this project a reality without stress or having to make too many compromises.
Rudolf Amstutz
Current album: hedi drescht – “äinigermasse dehäi” simonefelber.ch
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SIMONE FELBER
07.06.2023
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start. At monthly intervals, we present the eight recipients of the 2022 «Get Going!» grant individually.
This year’s call for a «Get Going!» contribution generated a great response. 225 dossiers from all parts of the country and all genres were submitted. We thank all those who manifested their ideas and did not make the jury’s decision easy. In the end, eight projects were selected that wonderfully reflect the enormous diversity and vitality of today’s Swiss music scene.
The recipients of a «Get Going!» grant 2022 in the amount of CHF 25,000 are:
The Ticino harp virtuoso has made a name for herself with her cross-genre compositions, in which she constantly explores and expands the possibilities of her instrument. The «Get Going!» grant now allows her to research the development of an additional element for the acoustic harp. This extension aims to overcome the limits of the tonal spectrum of the harp. This creates new scope for expanding the harp in order to create a new hybrid instrumental language. Website
Hasan Nakhleh from Bern has two objectives with his TootArd project: on the one hand, he aims to experiment with the many possibilities in the field of rhythms and tuning, and on the other hand he wants to bring together people on the dance floors of the world with his Global Grooves and Arabic lyrics. The «Get Going!» grant now allows him to take enough time for the fourth TootArd album to further develop his sound. Among other things, he wants to reprogram analogue and digital synthesisers with quarter tones in different scales. Website PORTRAIT
Singer-songwriter, Louis Jucker, from La Chaux-de-Fonds has created a completely independent world in recent years. With his sparingly intoned, experimental songs, he creates a soothing anachronism in the midst of a hectic everyday life. The «Get Going!» grant is now supporting him in a multi-year project that will culminate in the construction of a recording machine that is supposed to work without the use of electricity. The aim is to respond to the state of the world by creating local and simple ways of producing music. Website
The Lucerne-based musician, producer and composer, Céline-Giulia Voser, has published three solo albums as Cégiu, in which she has always explored new musical and compositional paths. For her new work «Coiled Continuum», she uses the «Get Going!» grant to explore the topic of psychoacoustic perception in depth. The aim is not only to create music that sounds different depending on the place, environment and time, but also to evoke individual feelings in the listeners through sound manipulation. Website PORTRAIT
With her projects «Simone Felbers Iheimisch», «hedi drescht» and «famm», Lucerne singer, Simone Felber, is one of the main protagonists of new Swiss folk music. Her musical home lies at the border between tradition and modernity, between classical studies and unheard-of innovation. In recent years, Felber has been forced to deal with death on a regular basis due to the loss of loved ones. With the «Get Going!» grant, she can now expand her project, which contrasts the classical dance of the dead with traditional folk music dance. The aim is to create her own dance of the dead, which due to the lightness of the dance allows a new perspective on death. Website PORTRAIT
Mario Batkovic is one of the most virtuoso and internationally renowned Swiss composers and musicians. The accordionist from Bern is involved in numerous projects, builds innovative instruments and experiments incessantly in the field of tension between pop, rock and contemporary music. In order to explore and create new sound spaces, incessant research, development, composition and experimentation are central to his work. Thanks to the «Get Going!» contribution, Mario Batkovic is now given one of the most important factors for creativity: time! Website
JUL DILLIER (Jul Dillier / Flora Geiẞelbrecht / Bernhard Hadriga)
Obwalden resident, Jul Dillier, aptly describes himself as a tune artist and sound poet. A graduate pianist and percussionist, he works on numerous projects ranging from jazz to improvisation, theatre and radio play music, text, performance and sound art. With the help of the «Get Going!» grant, «Ei Gen Klang», a one-hour, multi-sensory performance made up of sounds, words, images and tastes that aims to trace its origins, should now be developed. This will be done in collaboration with violist, vocalist and lyricist Flora Geißelbrecht, as well as guitarist, video artist and qualified geneticist Bernhard Hadriga. Website
The Kaleidoscope String Quartet refuses to let itself be confined in the straitjacket of classical chamber music and in recent years has dared to push the boundaries in many directions in recent years and has thus also attracted attention at the most varied of festivals (including Cully Jazz and Murten Classics). The pandemic interrupted her latest project “Five” which is now gaining momentum again thanks to the «Get Going!» grant. Bandoneon player, Michael Zisman, is not just a fifth member who wants to keep venturing into unexplored territory. With the new violist, Vincent Brunel, an important personnel change has also been made, with which “Five” is to be transformed into a follow-up project on the basis of new compositional developments. Website
Réka Csiszér is a singer, composer, multi-instrumentalist and performer. Classically trained in piano, violoncello and flute, she completed her studies in jazz singing at the ZhdK in 2017. Csiszér repeatedly builds bridges between different genres with projects in theater and film. Now she wants to realize an ambitious solo project with “VÍZ”. An interdisciplinary total work of art (performance-film sound), which, in collaboration with other artists, generates an audio-visual space in which Réka Csiszér not only explores her stylistic range of ambient, classical, avant-folk and electronic music, but at the same time wants to deepen the relationship to her Hungarian mother tongue and her Transylvanian roots.
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start.
The composer and musician Isandro Ojeda-García is pursuing a solo career as an audio-visual performer. He is also a member of the Insub Meta Orchestra (IMO) as well as musician and artistic co-director of the band TRES OJOS and the festival unfold-LAB, which is co-produced in collaboration with the University of Geneva. For years, the Geneva-based artist has been working on interdisciplinary projects between the conflicting priorities of composition and improvisation, of music and video art, together with various artists of different origins. With his large-scale project “alt_A|V-LIB”, one of his aims is to overcome the classical score on a technical and artistic level by developing an alternative, transversal and hybrid communication system between musicians of different traditions and artists of the performing arts. isandroojedagarcia.tumblr.com
arttv Portrait –––––––––––––––––––
ISANDRO OJEDA-GARCÍA
14.09.2021
«Get Going!» has existed as a FONDATION SUISA funding offer since 2018. With this new form of a grant, creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start.
Joy Frempong and Marcel Blatti make up OY. The Swiss duo, Berliners by choice, plan to go on a sustainable tour and find inspiration as they stroll through cities they are visiting. The «Get Going!» grant from FONDATION SUISA supports them with their “Messages from Walls” project.
Together with the Bern musician, Marcel Blatti, the Zurich singer, Joy Frempong, deliberately pushes the boundaries of musical genres in the duo OY and transforms them into garish avant-pop with meaningful content. OY’s albums are always conceptual and deal with sociopolitical issues in a variety of ways – often enriched with audiovisual elements or texts and images in book form. With their “Messages from Walls” project, the duo living in Berlin want to search for messages on walls in public spaces during the upcoming tour that have the potential to bring these walls down. With the help of partners, this content will be visually condensed into an artistic political statement, which will subsequently lead to an album of the same name and an accompanying blog.
Joy Frempong and Marcel Blatti, the last OY album “Space Diaspora” was very successful. The next one will be released soon. What can we expect?
Marcel: We’ve summarised our last two albums musically. Joy’s lyrics are consistent throughout these albums and that’s where we pick up from and develop everything further.
Joy: The record reflects what’s happening around us. It’s both post-past and pre-future (laughs). It’s about identity, injustices, but it also conveys positive aspects of our time.
You are going on tour with this album – and this is where your «Get going!» project comes in.
Both of them: Correct!
How did you come up with this project?
Marcel: We’ve been on tour very often in recent years. That’s something which we’re very fortunate to have experienced, but sometimes things also get very hectic. You travel to the venue, give a concert on the same day, and the tour continues the next day. During this period, we felt a yearning to stay longer in the respective places and to use the stay for research and writing new songs. The ideas that arise during this process are also meant to lead to a live blog – an alternative way of staying in contact with fans far removed from the monopolised Facebook channels. However, this “slow touring” can’t be funded through the usual tour budgets, which is where «Get Going!» comes into play.
Joy: At the same time, we’re thus also able to travel in a more environmentally friendly way. Touring whilst not forgetting the increase in global warming is an important issue for many. We’re in a paradoxical situation because we’re not a local band, but are generating interest throughout the whole of Europe. One of the reasons people practice this profession is because they like to move around. And artists should have the opportunity for cultural exchange. At the same time, we also have a duty to achieve this in a more sustainable way.
Marcel: However, not in a form whereby everyone just sits at home streaming concerts. The coronavirus lockdown has clearly shown that this doesn’t work. You have to be able to physically experience the energy of a concert.
An additional component of your project is dealing with statements found on urban walls.
Joy: If you walk through Berlin, you’ll encounter a lot of street art and political graffiti. Sometimes it’s aimed directly at the neighbourhood, but it can also be philosophical or witty. There is, for example, a jogging track where you can read the following spray-painted text each time you complete a round: “Can’t keep running away”. Not all slogans work as lyrics, but it’s a different approach to getting to know a city and its culture if you try to explore an area based on such statements.
Wall hunting?
Marcel: (Laughs) exactly! It’s all about keeping your own senses sharpened and the question of how what you see then interacts with your own imagination.
After all, OY is more than just music. The visual implementation, the costumes, the accompanying books – that really is heading towards a complete art form. Was that the plan?
Marcel: We simply have a wide range of interests. And if you put your whole heart and soul into a band, then everything else that fascinates you automatically flows into it as well. We’ve always had very good contact with other art forms and this has increased over the years. We put a lot of love into our projects – from stage design to the cover.
The OY blog says: “There is hope our society could learn lessons”. Optimism in a world where nothing seems to work?
Joy: Sometimes you feel powerless against those who call themselves realists. However, I think that a change in the right direction is under way. Sometimes crises trigger upheavals. There’s a fear that people want to return to the “normal” state of affairs after COVID-19, but like many others, we want to change something, and we’re using this turning point as a catalyst for fundamental change.
What do you think of «Get Going!» as a funding model?
Marcel: We are progressive in Switzerland where cultural funding is concerned. Nevertheless, it’s time to find new forms that better cater to creative artists’ daily needs. «Get Going!» is therefore not only a huge stroke of luck for us – it’s also a groundbreaking format.
Joy: Funding is usually tied to productions. «Get Going!», on the other hand, is more open and intended, for example, as support for the creative process. Especially in our case, all the preparatory work for a new project is very important. “Get Going!” is therefore a huge relief. It’s as if a new window were opening on the horizon. That’s such a great feeling.
FONDATION SUISA started awarding new grants in 2018. Under the heading of «Get Going!», creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start.
Electronically processed everyday sounds are combined with elements of ländler music to create a new listening experience: this is what the double bass player and composer, Pirmin Huber, wants to develop and realise for his new project. The «Get Going!» grant is supporting him with this project.
The Schwyz composer and double bass player, Pirmin Huber, has been experimenting with new ways of combining Swiss folk music with other genres to create new sounds since he completed his jazz studies (majoring in composition) at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. Whether as a soloist or as a member of the “Ländlerorchester” (Ländler Orchestra), “Stereo Kulisse”, “Ambäck” or of the “Gläuffig” formation: Huber redefines folk music and blends it with techno, jazz, classical or electronic music. Now Pirmin Huber wants to conduct a type of “field recording” research with the help of electronically manipulated everyday noises and the folk music sounds of his double base and other instruments he plays. The whole thing should lead to a work that challenges our listening habits, thus reflecting the world at this extraordinary time.
Pirmin Huber, how did the idea for this project come about?
Pirmin Huber: I started out playing folk music, that is to say acoustic music, and I have increasingly delved into electronic music. By tinkering with new recording techniques, I have come up with ideas that I want to develop further. I grew up on a farm, and we also had a carpenter’s workshop there. I was as fascinated by the sounds of the saw as I was by all the other sounds, and I already tried to imitate them with my musical instruments at that time. In my «Get Going!» project, I start with the sounds I can create with my instruments, double bass, Schwyzerörgeli (an accordion first made in the canton of Schwyz), guitar, piano or Glarus zither, and combine them with typical everyday sounds that I make seem unfamiliar with the help of electronic music. Since my youth, I have been asking myself the following question: how can you make music from these sounds. Now I can afford quite a few tools, thus giving me the opportunity to get deeply involved with the project.
What comes first? The sound collection and then the composition or is it the other way around?
It’s a mixture of the two. New opportunities keep opening up while I work. It’s all part of the process. It’s important to me that I create a very specific mood with my music. The finished work will consist of several pieces that flow together or at least relate to each other. It could be described as a type of suite.
You shift from one style to the next with ease. As a double bass player, you always set the tone. Can connections or interfaces between folk music, classical music, jazz, pop, rock or techno be identified from this position?
Perhaps. In any case, techno and ländler music are very closely related genres. This may be difficult to understand from the outside (laughs), but the energy that comes from playing is the same for techno as it is for ländler music, which is after all also dance music. I think you first have to have played both to experience this common feature. In my project, I am trying to create a kind of modern ländler music with electronics and grooves.
Nature and urban life: do you get the inspiration you need from these conflicting elements?
I need both. As soon as one of them is no longer there, it feels like something is missing. That’s probably why it’s logical that I want to bring these two opposing poles together. I’ve had three strings to my bow for a long time: folk music, contemporary music and techno. However, I feel that they are one.
The «Get Going!» grant is intended to provide start-up financing without any result-related expectations. What do you think of this funding model?
I think it’s great! The freedom it gives us serves as motivation to really achieve something great. After all, I had conceived the idea for my project a long time ago, but then things kept getting in the way. And much ultimately depends on whether you can afford to execute such a project and also implement it without any stress. «Get Going!» allows me to do just that.
FONDATION SUISA started awarding new grants in 2018. Under the heading of «Get Going!», creative and artistic processes that do not fall within established categories are given a financial jump-start.
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