Swiss Focus in East Asian Jazz Festivals

One of the biggest Jazz Festival in Asia, Jarasum International Jazz Festival in Korea, will shed the spotlight on Switzerland this October. Under the support of Pro Helvetia Shanghai, Swiss musicians Colin Vallon Trio, Schnellertollermeier (STM) and Tobias Preisig are invited to perform in their robust program. Besides Jarasum, their tour is replete with meaningful gigs at OCT-LOFT Jazz Festival in Shenzhen, Match&Fuse Festival in Tokyo/Osaka, and many other music houses in China and Japan.

Colin Vallon Trio

Colin Vallon – piano
Patrice Moret – bass
Julian Sartorius – drums

Colin Vallon Trio is an innovative and very well-respected band of their generation. Formed in 1999, they have a wealth of successful tours and concerts to their name, and have found its own space in the crowded world of the piano trio by quietly challenging its conventions. Pianist Vallon and bassist Patrice Moret have also strengthened their reputation as part of the Elina Duni Quartet, touring Japan and Korea in 2017 and anchoring themselves in the jazz scenes there. Colin Vallon will return to Japan after the OCT-LOFT Festival to perform his solo for the Match&Fuse Festival in Tokyo.

Schnellertollermeier (STM)

Andi Schnellmann – bass
Manuel Troller – guitar
David Meier – drums

STM is an in-demand trio with an original musical identity and part of a dynamic contemporary European music scene.

STM plays music without compromises. Ranging from modern composition, minimal music and improv to brute rock music, their style defies genre boundaries with an instrumental power that lets heartbeat the head easily. The idea of a band that sounds like one organism can be perceived in a unified energy – a music containing as much explosive force as beauty and depth.

Their third album “X” received enthusiastic critics from all over the world and made it into the list of the 12 best albums of 2015 in US-Wall Street Journal among Björk, Kendrick Lamar, Courtney Barnett and Battles. Their fourth album “RIGHTS” is released in 2017 also via Cuneiform Records.

Tobias Preisig Solo

Tobias Preisig – Violin, member of Egopusher

Tobias Preisig was admitted as the first violin student at the Swiss Jazz School in Berne. He has performed several times in Japan, China and Korea with his electronic duo Egopusher, which has frequented China two times on tour and gained reputation. His reputation was bolstered by his guest performance with post-rock forerunner LEECH’s first tour to ten grand Chinese cities in 2017, and Youn Sun Nah for the kick-off concert at the Winter Olympics in Seoul in 2018.