The group SIX was founded by Jacques Demierre and Urs Leimgruber in spring 2007.

SIX
Jacques Demierre, piano
François Houle, clarinet
Charlotte Hug, viola and voice
Urs Leimgruber, saxophones
Thomas Lehn, analogue synthesizer
Dorothea Schürch, voice and singing saw

[http://jacquesdemierre.com/six.html|SIX] is an ensemble of musicians who perform sound improvisation paying attention in a very detailed manner to the room where sounds are produced. The music improvised by SIX in a given space carries the mark of this space, that it is based in some sense on its soundprint, on its form, whether it uses or reveals its acoustic potentialities.

Cornelius Cardew: "the natural context provides a score which the players are unconsciously interpreting in their playing. Not a score that is explicitly articulated in the music and hence of no further interest to the listener as is generally the case in traditional music, but one that coexists inseparably with the music, standing side by side with it and sustaining it“.

Biographies

Jacques Demierre, piano lives in Geneva. Has a long experience as a pianist, performer, composer. His musical and sound work takes various directions: improvised music, contemporary music, sound poetry, sound installation. His compositions and sound realisations are concerned with the activity of listening and with sound space, and develop a very cross and interdisciplinary conception of music. He collaborates with many improvising musicians, Barre Philips,Urs Leimgruber, Thomas Lehn, Joëlle Léandre, Axel Dörner, Fritz Hauser, Sainkho Namtchylak, Hans Koch, Brandon Labelle, Jason Kahn, Butch Morris, Carlos Zingaro, Jaap Blonk, Barry Guy, Lucas Niggli, Sylvie Courvoisir, Hann Bennink, Rhodri Davis, Isabelle Duthoit, Dorothea Schürch, Phil Minton,…

François Houle, clarinet has established himself as one of today's most inventive musicians, in all of the diverse musical spheres he embraces: classical, jazz, new music, improvised music, and world music. Whether he's performing works by Mozart or Messiaen, appearing as a featured soloist with orchestra, or improvising and embracing live, interactive electronics, François demystifies music for audiences everywhere. His extensive touring has led to solo appearances at major festivals across Canada, the United States and Europe, and he has released more than a dozen recordings, earning multiple Juno Award and West Coast Music Award nominations. He is a faculty member at the Vancouver Community College School of Music, and in 2006 he became Artistic Director of the Vancouver Creative Music Institute. In 2008 he was appointed as “Associate Composer” of the Canadian Music Centre.

Charlotte Hug, viola & voice lives in Zurich and on the road. She completed her studies in fine arts and music and received various distinctions and commissions. She worked as “artist in residence” in London, Paris, Cork capital of culture in 2005 and Berlin and was awarded the city of Zurich prize for composition in 2006. She is known for her solo performances in distinctive locations such as the ice tunnels of the Rhône glacier, the half demolished bunker in Berlin Humboldthain, the House of Detention, a 250 year old former prison in Farringdon in London, the hot healing sulphur springs beneath the former luxury hotel of Verenahof in Baden, Switzerland or the dockyard in Coph on the Irish Atlantic coast. Hug seeks to develop instrumental techniques to their fullest possible extent, which includes the “soft bow technique”, by means of which she can play up to eight voices on her instrument. She plays a viola made by J.G. Thir in 1763. She also specializes in combining the sounds of viola and voice. What has resulted is an unmistakable and distinct tonal language.

Thomas Lehn, analogue synthesizer develops as an interpreting and improvising pianist individual forms of expression in the filed of live-elektronic music. Since 1989 he concentrats him self to use analogous systemes, which allows him by a direct acces to the single elements of the electronic sound synthesis to react immediatlely in the structur and form process of live music. As a synthesizer player he performs at festivals and during tours in Europa, USA, Canada, Japan, Australia and Newseeland in duos with Gerry Hemingway, Paul Lovens, Eugene Chadbourne, Marcus Schmickler and Frederic Blondy, in Trios with KONK PACK (Roger Turner & Tim Hodgkinson), FUTCH (Jon Rose & Johannes Bauer), TOOT (Phil Minton & Axel Doerner), THERMAL (John Butcher & Andy 'Ex' Moor), and large ensembles like E-RAX, CORTET, MIMEO.

Urs Leimgruber, saxophones is a key member of the European scene of contemporary improvised music. He specializes in solo concerts and performs regularly with the Trio Leimgruber/Demierre/Phillips and with Quartet Noir (with Marilyn Crispell, Joëlle Léandre, Fritz Hauser) in Europe, Canada, USA, Japan, and Cuba. His countless collaborations have resulted in concerts and recordings with Fred Frith, Steve Lacy, Lauren Newton, Evan Parker, Keith Rowe, Günter Christmann, Sunny Murray, Thomas Lehn, Günter Müller, John Butcher, Axel Dörner, Günter Christmann and many others. He also has been engaged for New Music projects with the Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quintet and the ARTE Saxophone Quartet. During the 1970s, he was the co-founder of the Electric jazz and free-music group, OM.

Dorothea Schürch, voice and singing saw is practising improvisation and performance. She is performing all over europe at the Free Music Workshop in Berlin, Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon, Jazz Festival Willisau, Canaille in Frankfurt, Concepts of Doing Stuttgart, London Jazz Festival, Total Music Meeting Berlin.. Several scholarships at the Migros Kulturprozent Switzerland, at the Academie Schloss Solitude Stuttgart and the City of Zürich. She works as an improviser togehter with Phil Minton, Phil Wachsman, John Butcher, Roger Turner, Tim Hodgkinson, John Russel, Hans Schneider, Paul Lytton, Paul Lovens, Stephan Wittwer.