Charlotte Hug

Charlotte Hug conducts the Lucerne Festival Academy with the orchestral work Nachtplasmen for Son-Icons and video score at the Lucerne Festival 2011

Charlotte Hug (* 1965 in Zurich ) is a Swiss violist , vocalist, composer and illustrator. She lives in Zurich and London .

Live and act

After graduating from high school, Hug started training as a primary school teacher in 1984. After a stay in France, she completed art training in the Atelier Testa in Zurich. From 1990 to 1995 she studied viola , first with Henrik Crafoord in Bern and from 2000 with Paul Silverthorne at the Royal Academy of Music . She studied further in "Scenic figures" at the University of Art and Design Zurich and the KlangKunstBühne the University of the Arts at Christina Kubisch , Dieter Schnebel and Lauren Newton .

The extreme musician is constantly expanding the limits of her instrument and reinventing the viola - this on her instrument, built by the Viennese violin maker JG Thir, from the year 1763. Among other things, she developed the soft bow technique with which she can play up to eight voices . Hug's specialty is mixes of viola and voice. This is how their unmistakably own sound language is created. She appeared together with other artists, but also as a soloist with her own music performances at international festivals in Europe, Canada and the United States and has released several solo albums. Hug has played with the London Improvisers Orchestra in the field of free and conceptual improvisation and developed concepts for them or a. worked with Maggie Nichols , John Edwards , Phil Minton , Evan Parker , Elliott Sharp , Pat Thomas , Andy Guhl , Tony Wren and Phil Wachsmann . Some of the projects are also documented on CD. Collaboration with Alberto Venzago (photo, film), Jossi Wieler (theater and opera direction), Fine Kwiatkowski (dance), among others .

Hug has also emerged as a draftsman and composer. In the context of art and music, Hug's sound drawings, son icons, received international attention. With these she developed a method of composition. This is how spatial and video scores are created for solo to orchestral works: B. the orchestral work Nachtplasmen for Son-Icons and Video Score, premiered with the Lucerne Festival Academy in 2011. She has shown solo exhibitions with installations at Swissnex San Francisco, the Sirius Arts Center Cobh Cork in Ireland and the Lucerne Art Museum. In 2011 Hug was "artiste étoile" at the Lucerne Festival .

Hug gives master classes in improvisation and "instant composing". She gives lectures and gives performance lectures in the broad field of “transdisciplinarity in the arts”. She is visiting lecturer at universities and art schools, e.g. B. MC Gill University Montreal, ZHdK Hochschule der Künste Zürich, CNMAT of the University of California Berkeley, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago etc.

Honourings and prices

Hug's work received numerous awards, including

• 2000 studio grant in London from the Aargau Board of Trustees
• 2004 studio grant at the Cité internationale des arts in Paris in the canton of Zurich
• 2005 “artist in residence” in Cork Capital of Culture with a composition commission
• 2006 Composition Prize (work year) from the City of Zurich
• 2010 composition commissions, a. a. by Pro Helvetia and the Lucerne Festival
• 2011 “artiste étoile” at the Lucerne Festival
• 2012 “artist in residence” in Nairs
• 2013 studio grant in Berlin of the Canton of Zurich
• 2014 “Research residency” in South Africa by Pro Helvetia

Discography

• MauerrauM WandrauM (1999) (Solo viola & electronics)
• Certain Questions (2002) (With Pat Thomas , electronics)
• Transitions (2002) (With Maggie Nicols , voice and Caroline Kraabel , saxophone)
• Brilliant Days (2003) (With Chantal Laplante, electronics)
• Neuland (2003) (solo viola)
• Flying Aspidistra # 5 (2006) (Live with Fred Lonberg-Holm , cello)
• Acoustic electronics (2007) (With Nina De Heney bass and Christian Jormin drums)
• Pi: k (2007) (With Elliott Sharp , guitar and electronics)
• Lift (2009) (With Guillermo Galindo , "interactive cybertotemic musical instrument")
• Gocce Stellari (2009) (string quartet with Phil Wachsmann , Marcio Mattos and John Edwards )
• Fine extension (2010) (With Fred Lonberg-Holm, cello)
• Slipway To Galaxies (2011) (Solo viola & voice)
• Bouquet (2012) (With Frédéric Blondy piano)
• Paragone d'archi (2014) (With Stefano Pastor violin)

Web links

• Web presence with discography