Nominees of the current Festival|
FABIAN ANDERHUB Fabian Anderhub can be characterized as a true shooting star in the Swiss Blues scene. Born in 1981 in central Switzerland, after emigrating to Canada with his parents at the age of 14, he discovered his great love for the guitar and the blues on the other side of the Atlantic. Even during school Anderhub founded his first band, playing in bars and clubs in the greater Quebec area, and creating - also with his appearance at the prestigious Montreal Blues Festival - a reputation as a powerful performer. Back in Switzerland again, one thing followed another for Fabian Anderhub: Early 2012 he toured successfully with Wishbone Ash for 35 concerts around Europe. In August 2012 he won the 2nd Swiss Blues Challenge in Sierre and will now represent Switzerland at the European Blues Challenge in Toulouse and at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis. His second album «It's A Blues Thing» is participating at the competition of the Blues Foundation for the «Best Self-Produced Blues Album». Finally, the name of the guitarist shows up in the program of top events such as the Lucerne Blues Festival, the Blues Festival Basel and the Swiss Rock & Blues Cruise. RICHARD KOECHLI Active as a professional in the music business for the past twenty years, Richard Koechli has been successfully juggling many balls at once. His virtuoso Bottleneck technique not only characterizes his own, bluesy projects: as a studio musician and producer he also spices up publications from all branches of Roots Music. With Dänu Brüggemann, Reto Burrell, Dänu Wisler and especially with Blues Max, Koechli's sensitive musical approach is well established in this country. In addition, Richard Koechli shares with us his vast knowledge of music history and guitar technique in several books. His epic "Masters Of Blues Guitar" garnered the coveted German Music Edition Award «Best Edition 2011», and has since been translated into English. With his brilliant latest album «Howlin' With The Bad Boys», by which he is paying homage to his heroes of the American Folk Blues in a very personal way, Richard Koechli also won attention in other countries. In the French Blues-Indie charts the oeuvre moved right up to the top. In spring 2013 Koechli will publish his brand new album, a CD with live concert recordings of his current blues tour. www.richardkoechli.ch ROLF WINTER The blues is a natural and essential part of Rolf Winter's life. But Rolf is not rocking the stages of the music world. His place is rather in the background, where he's working discreetly but none the less successfully and with immense passion for the blues in our country. As operator of the website www.bluesnews.ch («The Swiss Blues Portal») the computer expert provides interested music fans with an almost inexhaustible source of information with news, concert announcements, concert reports, productions, links and forums on the national and international blues scene. In addition, the Basel citizen is one of our country's representatives at the European Blues Union, and also designs the Swiss page of their Internet platform www.bluesyou.com. As a board member of the Blues Festival Basel, the 67-year-old is also responsible for the website of this event (www.bluesbasel.ch). In addition, he's President of the Jury of the Swiss Blues Challenge. Last but not least, Rolf Winter presents his personal blues favourites at the web radio station Blue Road (www.bluesz.de) as a guest presenter. 31. October 2012, Marco Piazzalonga Handing over of the Swiss Blues Award at the 14th Blues Festival Basel, Saturday, April 13, 2013, |
