Irène Schweizer

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Irène Schweizer in the Cologne Loft , 2014

Irène Schweizer (born June 2, 1941 in Schaffhausen ) is a Swiss pianist and drummer who is one of the founders of European free jazz . Her independent work, which has been consistently developed since the early 1960s, is about "a freely improvising style of playing that combines noises, percussive elements, fast clusters , some of which are hit with the arms, and more conventional piano techniques". She is considered "Europe's most experienced jazz pianist".

Live and act

Schweizer learned the hand organ as a child , then at the age of twelve she was initially self-taught with piano and drums before taking lessons from a private teacher. As a fourteen year old she played as a drummer in a Dixieland band . After attending a business school, she earned her living as a secretary. In 1958 she turned to modern jazz and performed annually with the Modern Jazz Preachers at the amateur festival in Zurich until 1961 , and won in 1960. Encounters with Abdullah Ibrahim and the Blue Notes around Chris McGregor (in the legendary jazz café Africana in Zurich ) and with Cecil Taylor (1966) led her to free jazz . In particular with her trio, to which the drummer Mani Neumeier and the bassist Uli Trepte (both later with Guru Guru ) belonged since 1963, then the drummer Pierre Favre and the bassist Peter Kowald since 1968 , she played at many festivals. After an era of searching in which they u. a. appeared in a trio with Buschi Niebergall and Allen Blairman , from 1973 she worked with saxophonist Rüdiger Carl , z. Some of them again joined the trio with the South African drummer Louis Moholo . Since 1976, when she celebrated a spectacular success at the Willisau Jazz Festival ( Musical Monsters ), she has also given solo concerts.

On the one hand, Schweizer loves completely free improvisation, on the other hand, there are echoes of more traditional forms and compositions of classics such as Thelonious Monk and Duke Ellington as well as South African music. In addition to her musical activities, she was active as a feminist from an early age . Therefore she was also active in the Feminist Improvising Group around 1980 ; the trio Les Diaboliques with Joëlle Léandre and Maggie Nicols still reflects this today. In the 1990s she also worked with Marilyn Crispell , the London Jazz Composers' Orchestra and Co Streiff , then also in a trio with Makaya Ntshoko and Omri Ziegele . She is also important as an organizer in the Swiss jazz scene. She is significantly involved in the creation of the Taktlos Festival (Zurich) and the Intakt Records label .

Schweizer lives in Zurich- Aussersihl and was nominated as a candidate for the alternative list in the 2007 National Council elections .

Prizes and awards

Schweizer received the Culture Prize of the City of Schaffhausen in 1990 and the Art Prize of the City of Zurich in 1991. The Swiss director Gitta Gsell documented the life of the jazz musician in a full-length film. In 2013 she was awarded the "Nachtigall 2013", the special prize of the German record critics . The laudation praises her “artistic and personal integrity, her friendly nature, her creative restlessness, her organizational talent, her versatility and her presence in the most varied of connections and of course, above all, her development as a pianist”; these characteristics «made her one of the most exciting figures in jazz». In 2018 she was awarded both the 2018 Culture Prize of the Canton of Zurich and the Swiss Grand Prix Music, endowed with CHF 100,000.

Works

The CD gives an overview of Irène Schweizer's work

  • Irène Schweizer Portrait Intakt CD 105/2005

literature

  • Lislot Frei: Swiss Irène . In: Bruno Spoerri (Hrsg.): Biographical Lexicon of Swiss Jazz CD supplement to: Spoerri, Bruno (Hrsg.): Jazz in Switzerland. History and stories . Chronos-Verlag, Zurich 2005, ISBN 3-0340-0739-6
  • Christian Broecking That irrepressible feeling of freedom. Irène Schweizer - jazz, avant-garde, politics . Creative People Books, Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-938763-44-5

Web links

Commons : Irène Schweizer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cit. according to Martin Kunzler : Jazz-Lexikon. Volume 2: M – Z (= rororo-Sachbuch. Vol. 16513). 2nd Edition. Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg 2004, ISBN 3-499-16513-9 .
  2. ↑ Prisca Ketterer Miss Schweizer reaches the summit , Die Zeit , May 12, 2005
  3. ↑ Ulrich Stock: Irène Schweizer: Just leave the practice behind . In: The time . May 24, 2016, ISSN  0044-2070 ( zeit.de [accessed on May 26, 2016]).
  4. ^ Ulrich Stock The first woman at the piano WoZ , October 6, 2005
  5. ↑ Irène Schweizer is “Nachtigall 2013” ​​in Schweizer Musikzeitung 2013
  6. ↑ Irène Schweizer receives Swiss Music Prize , Basler Zeitung May 8, 2018
  7. ↑ Christoph Wagner: A biography about Irène Schweizer: For the winner a men's shirt. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Retrieved May 26, 2016 .
personal data
SURNAME Swiss, Irène
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss pianist and drummer
DATE OF BIRTH June 2, 1941
PLACE OF BIRTH Schaffhausen