As the anticipation builds for the Eurosonic Noorderslag (ESNS) 2024 festival in Groningen, Netherlands, music enthusiasts and industry insiders alike are gearing up for a spectacular showcase of emerging European talent. Scheduled from January 17 to 21, the event promises a platform for 238 artists to captivate the audience of 4,000 delegates and around 40,000 visitors.
Young rising electro pop artist and singer-songwriter CHAiLD will join C’est Karma on the line-up of the 2024 edition of ESNS. Influenced by the likes of Troye Sivan, Sam Smith, Julia Michaels, and Mø, CHAiLD has crafted a distinctive pop style that integrates his Italian roots, creating a sonic journey that resonates with authenticity. Beyond his musical prowess, CHAiLD is a generational voice for the queer youth, offering a channel for self-expression through his evocative melodies.
Artists who perform at Eurosonic will also be included in the ESNS Exchange Programme, which helps European acts to be booked at festivals outside their home countries and gives them extensive media exposure in collaboration with the EBU (of which radio 100,7 is a member), export offices (including Kultur | lx – Arts Council Luxembourg) and local media.
More information here.
After a first edition of the Contemporary Music Focus that took place in September 2022 in the frame of the Festival 33,7, organised by United Instruments of Lucilin and the Kulturfabrik, Kultur | lx – Arts Council Luxembourg is happy to join forces with the Philharmonie Luxembourg from November 17th to 19th on the occasion of their rainy days festival.
The programme, curated by the Luxembourgish composer Catherine Kontz, will put light on composers such as Albena Petrovic, Roby Steinmetzer, Marco Pütz, Catherine Kontz, Nik Bohnenberger, Camille Kerger, as well as Ivan Boumans. Ensembles such as Ars Nova Lux, United Instruments of Lucilin, Noise Watchers Unlimited as well as the Trio WAS+ will share the stage with the London-based Langham Research Centre and the Belgian Ensemble Ictus.
During these three Focus days, Kultur | lx will invite a delegation of professionals from contemporary music festivals and ensembles located in numerous places in Europe. These invitation programmes play a significant part in fulfilling Kultur | lx’ mission to promote and foster the identification of Luxembourgish artists on the international level. On the one hand, the international guests will have several occasions to see the works of Luxembourgish composers and musicians during the three festival days. On the other hand, the Focus will consist of several exchanges and network moments, notably through a speed meeting session during which Luxembourgish artists and professionals will have an occasion to meet the international delegation invited for the event. These meetings are crucial for the establishment of contacts and synergies to further help the identification and circulation of the Luxembourgish musical creation on an international level.
About rainy days
rainy days is a festival dedicated to new music. For four days, the event will feature numerous insights and perspectives in different compact formats that can satisfy experts as well as curious people who want to get a first impression of the current state of today’s musical creation – aesthetic experiences for the here and now, as well as nourishment for your own personal memory!
This edition is dedicated to the topic of memory, that is quite tackled in the arts nowadays. The concerts, performances, installations that are presented during the festival are building ties, in their own way, sonic histories, tales, memory fragments and memory snippets extending from Morton Feldman, Christian Wolff to composers from the emerging new music scene.
Since 2016, Lët’z Arles has been bringing a bit of Luxembourgish creation to the Rencontres d’Arles. As an association that supports and promotes photography and artists linked to Luxembourg, Lët’z Arles offers each year to artists a complete creation and diffusion device. From July 1 to September 22, 2024, Luxembourg photographer Michel Medinger will be exhibiting at Chapelle de la Charité, curated by Sylvie Meunier.
Born in Luxembourg in 1941, Michel Medinger gradually developed a regular photographic practice. A self-taught photographer, he has experimented with a number of techniques: B/W photography, darkroom work using his own chemistries, cibachrome and Polaroids, creating a very special world for himself. An avid collector of objects, he uses these techniques in strange compositions filled with irreverent humor. His photographs, sometimes on iconoclastic subjects, are imbued with a sense of humour and poetry. Beyond his studio, he draws on objects from his everyday environment to construct his compositions and photographic tableaux, like a cabinet of curiosities. By obsessively staging them, with a penchant for surrealism, he introduces a singular narrative and relationships of scale. Michel Medinger leaves nothing to chance.
His work has taken the artist all over the world. He has exhibited his Polaroid Masterprints in Beijing, and taken part in exhibitions in Luxembourg, France, the USA, Denmark, Russia, Poland and Japan.
After ENGLBRT‘s acclaimed performances at the USINA23 festival, where they were spotted by renowned Belgian booker Peter Verstraelen, and their EP release show at Rotondes, the collaborative duo of Georges Goerens and Niels Engel are now taking to the stages of our neighbours in France and Belgium.
Their first show abroad will take place on the 8th of November at the Crossroads Festival in Roubaix (France). The festival was created in 2016 to promote French and international artists and provide a networking platform for professionals.
ENGLBRT’s unique sound, which combines electro, contemporary jazz and well-crafted indie pop, can also be heard on 22 November at De Zwerver in Leffinge (Belgium), when they support Compact Disk Dummies for their sold-out show.
Shortly after the turn of the year, Groningen (NL) will be the place to be for international music lovers and music industry professionals. From 17 to 21 January, ESNS (Eurosonic Noorderslag) will present more than 350 emerging European artists who will have the opportunity to perform in front of 4,000 delegates and around 40,000 visitors. Two acts from Luxembourg are part of the selected line-up. C’est Karma has already been announced on the recommendation of radio 100,7. The musician, passionate activist and pasta lover will be making her ESNS debut. The second act will be announced in the coming weeks.
Artists who perform at Eurosonic will also be included in the ESNS Exchange Programme, which helps European acts to be booked at festivals outside their home countries and gives them extensive media exposure in collaboration with the EBU (of which radio 100,7 is a member), export offices (including Kultur | lx – Arts Council Luxembourg) and local media.
More information here.
Sŵn (pronounced: suːn) is the Welsh word for “sound/noise” and also the namesake for one of Britain’s most exciting music festivals with a focus on emerging artists. Sŵn Festival takes place in Cardiff 20-22 October. As part of Kultur | lx’s partnership with the Excite network, DasRADIAL has been chosen to perform at this year’s festival edition on Sunday 22 October at Fuel Rock Club.
DasRADIAL, who released his new single “LIEBES-DRANG” two weeks ago, grows out of the absurdities of our digital age: a being, not man not machine, walks between dream and reality! Musician and actor Max Thommes, who spent 10 years as the drummer in the band INBORN! produced by acclaimed producer Ross Robinson, has been going his own way since 2019, creating a dystopian cosmos with DasRADIAL. After several works for the German State Theatre, he also produced the title track of the Arte documentary “UNTERM_RADAR”. With his electronic beats and sharp-tongued lyrics, DasRADIAL now seeks the symbiosis of art figure and musical live performance.
Excite is a highly-collaborative project between seven partner organisations based across Europe (BE, DE, LU, NO, NL, SE, UK) and leverages a dynamic mechanism to expedite the internationalisation of young artists and music businesses earlier in their careers and development. The delivery model is built around a core of ten partner festivals in their respective markets, with a small number of associated festivals and conferences in different territories – plus a curated stage which took place this year at The Great Escape in Brighton, UK.
More information and tickets are available here.
Each September, the international music industry turns its eyes to northern Germany for the Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg, Europe’s largest club festival and one of the most significant music events worldwide. This year, Kultur | lx once again presented a new edition of its renowned showcase series “lx finest – Sounds from Luxembourg” featuring talented artists like Josh Island, CHAiLD, MAZ, and DasRADIAL.
The festival kicked off on the opening night with a remarkable performance by C’est Karma at the Backseat showcase presented by Fanklub at Grüner Jäger as well as Florence Besch’s performance at the Thomas Read Pub presented by VUT Nord.
On Friday, Josh Island managed record-breaking three performances within four hours on three different stages. His journey began with an acoustic set at the MoPo-Mobil in the festival village, hosted by Hamburg’s tabloid newspaper Hamburger Morgenpost. This was followed by the N-Joy Bus session at the bustling Spielbudenplatz, organised by NDR Radio. Finally, he opened the “lx finest – Sounds from Luxembourg” showcase at Häkken club.
Before the showcase, the networking reception was well received with over 300 registered delegates including, including a small delegation of Luxembourgish professionals and journalists (from among others, Konektis Entertainment, Beast Records, Two Steps Twice, Kulturfabrik, Rotondes, den Atelier, opderschmelz and radio 100,7). Despite numerous concurrent shows on the festival’s packed schedule on Friday night, Josh Island, CHAiLD, MAZ and DasRADIAL all enjoyed large and enthusiastic crowds throughout the night.
On the festival’s final day, MAZ and guitarist Patrick Miranda (frontman of the band Pleasing) delivered an acoustic set at the MoPo-Mobil that left the audience with goosebumps and marked the end of the highly acclaimed Luxembourg program at the Reeperbahn Festival 2023 featuring a total of nine performances by six acts across five venues over four days.
The 2023 edition of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe welcome Luxembourg productions for the first time among the 3,553 shows from 67 countries. The Fringe, is an arts festival inaugurated in 1947 taking place every August in Edinburgh, Scotland, for three weeks. It’s currently the largest arts festival in the world. The Fringe – whose name refers to fringe theatre – is a non-juried festival with no selection committee, allowing any type of show to take part, and often featuring experimental work that would probably not have been presented at other festivals of its kind.
The Fringe is a recognised festival by international programmers who are looking for international creation. The festival is the ideal platform for showcasing contemporary work from the UK and 17 other countries in 2023, including the Luxembourg selection, which has been set up with the support of Kultur | lx.
Four Luxembourg productions took center stage at some of the festival’s most prestigious venues: stark bollock naked by Larisa Faber and Shoot the Cameraman by AWA – As We Are at Assembly, Lovefool by Gintare Parulyte at Summerhall and This is a scam. by Anne Klein at The Space UK.
This enabled them to confront a whole new audience and reach out to their peers from all over the world, as the festival registered 1,359 professionals from 49 countries. In the light of the public, professional and critical feedback, the Fringe should prove to be a career accelerator for the shows presented and their creators.
Kultur | lx will therefore continue its efforts in the years to come to support other companies as they explore the world’s largest platform for the performing arts.
Kultur | lx – Arts Council Luxembourg presents another edition of the celebrated |lx finest – Sounds from Luxembourg showcase at the Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg. Four acts will take the stage at HÄKKEN club in the heart of St. Pauli on Friday, September 22nd from 8:30p.m.: Josh Island (groovy singer-songwriter pop combined with soul and folk elements), CHAiLD (electro-pop with a trace of pleasing melancholy), MAZ (explosion of emo-rap with references to metal and punk), and DasRadial (electronic beats and cutting-edge lyrics from a dystopian dreamscape).
If you’re attending Reeperbahn Festival as pro/delegate, make sure to stop by early for our networking reception at 7:30p.m. with finger food and wine from Luxembourg!
RSVP HERE
Friday, 22. September at HÄKKEN
Spielbudenplatz 21/22, 20359 Hamburg
19:30 – Networking reception (only for delegates)
20:15- Doors open to the public
20:30 – 21:10 | Josh Island
21:45 – 22:25 | CHAiLD
23:00 – 23:40 | MAZ
00:15 – 00:55 | DasRadial
Josh Island | 20:30
(+ Friday 22th September at 16:15 – MOPO-Mobil in the Festival Village)
Josh Island is a true European. Born in the British roundabout town of Milton Keynes to a Dutch family, he moved to Germany and the Netherlands before eventually settling in Luxembourg. This natural curiosity for cultures and people is reflected in his music, with the ability to go beyond geopolitical boundaries. As a vocal powerhouse, soulful songwriter and engaging live performer, Josh Island has been steadily growing a loyal fan base across Europe. He draws inspirations from Sting, Jamie Cullum or John Mayer, a dynamic blend of catchy singer-songwriter pop with strong influences of soul and folk. At its core lies, Josh’s unique ability to connect with the crowd – his interactive shows breakdown invisible barriers between audience and artist. Since starting out playing local bars in Luxembourg at the age of 15, he has opened for James Morrison, Passenger and Clueso, toured the Benelux and Germany and released two EPs. He has worked with Guy Chambers (Robbie Williams, Kylie Minogue) and represented Luxembourg at the Eurotoire songwriting camp on Cyprus. On 15 September 2023, he is releasing his album ‘In My Head’, an introspective yet mature full-length debut, recorded by Portuguese producer Nelson Canoa (Sara Tavares, Carminho, Mariza) at his studio in Torres Vedras, the winegrowing region north of Lisbon. The Black Mamba (Eurovision 2021) was his studio band. The first singles went on to achieve national airplay in the Benelux and Germany and added to numerous playlists, further cementing him as one of Luxembourg’s most international pop songwriters. This fall, Josh is embarking on a 20-date European tour.
CHAiLD | 21:45
CHAiLD burst onto the music scene in 2019. The young rising pop artist from Luxembourg rapidly became known and stood out for his unique, soothing yet intense voice that pulls at your heartstrings and transports you into his melancholic universe. While there’s a nostalgic air to CHAiLD’s vocals, they also possess a modern twist resonating as vulnerable, strong, and intimate all at the same time. CHAiLD identifies as a Gen Z artist, standing up for a youth generation seeking self-expression. That said, a sincere approach to his music means CHAiLD wears his heart on his sleeve, a path that has helped attract a fan base attending his concerts and seeking out his music, which hails from all walks of life. Despite being on the scene for a relatively short time, CHAiLD has many remarkable achievements under his belt whether it is supporting major acts such as Nothing But Thieves, Dean Lewis, and Mahmood, or performing at local and international festivals. He’s also achieved extensive radio play and chart success in Luxembourg, as well as releasing his debut EP “Urgent Care” in 2023.
MAZ | 23:00
(Saturday 23rd September at 16:15 – MOPO-Mobil in the Village Festival)
Maz emerged from a conservative little town in Luxembourg, where the blueprint to a traditional way of life was put into his cradle in 1999. It took a while for his beautiful, yet gory poetry notes to escape his bedroom drawer; for the pride flag to appear between metal posters. Today, he puts his thoughts into an explosion of emo-rap with references to punk and metal music. He mixes skilful rap with distorted screams and melodic hooks; creating a dark, yet hopeful form of expression. As Maz enters the stage, he ties audiences up into the limb of a giant marionette. A powerful collective beast that puts up a fight against social injustices and inspires one to accept their own darkness just as much as their light. This captivating live energy seems to have escaped from secrecy, earning him slots at iconic festivals such as Sziget or ESNS and the award for the best live performance at the Luxembourg Music Awards in 2022. Maz is currently based in Berlin and Brussels and is working on his forthcoming album while currently releasing his EMO SEASON EP.
DasRadial | 00:15
DasRADIAL grows out of the absurdities of our digital age: a being, not man not machine, walks between dream and reality. Musician and actor Max Thommes, who spent 10 years as the drummer in the band INBORN! produced by acclaimed producer Ross Robinson, has been going his own way since 2019, creating a dystopian cosmos with DasRADIAL. After several works for the German State Theatre, he also produced the title track of the Arte documentary “UNTERM_RADAR”. With his electronic beats and sharp-tongued lyrics, DasRADIAL now seeks the symbiosis of art figure and live musical performance. On stage Max Thommes will be joined by drummer Wouter Rentema who also plays for Bonaparte and Sophie Hunger.
With C’est Karma one of Luxembourg’s most multifaceted musicians will also perform at the Reeperbahn Festival as part of the Hamburg Music Business X Backseat Showcase presented by Fanklub.
On her third EP, “Amuse-Bouche,” Karma’s style is covered in noise/industrial and hyperpop influences. The daughter of two first generation immigrants, and supporters of feminist and LGBTQ+ causes, approaches music as a tool for social change, also attacking the inaction on the climate crisis and the disparity between the filthy rich and the less fortunate (although she sometimes indulges in more sentimental remarks or mentions her love for pasta).
Wednesday, 20 September, 8:00p.m. at Grüner Jäger
Committed to foster the promotion and export the Luxembourgish jazz scene, Kultur | lx joins forces with CCRD opderschmelz for the Like A Jazz Machine Festival (May 10th to 14th 2023), to organise a Focus dedicated to Luxembourgish jazz. On May 12th and 13th, Kultur | lx will invite a delegation of international guests to discover the Luxembourgish projects featured at the festival.
On May 12th, two projects arising from opderschmelz residencies will be presented: Mathieu Clement and his collective will present their first compositions. They will be followed by Shauli Einav’s Living Organs Quartet.
On May 13th, the day will start with a concert by the young guitar player Veda Bartringer. The audience will then discover Greg Lamy’s new project, with trumpet player Stéphane Belmondo as a guest. In the evening, Michel Reis will present a new project with his German trio and the United Instruments of Lucilin contemporary music ensemble. The band Tele-Port will play the compositions from their new album Please Disperse, to be released very soon, and recorded during an opderschmelz residency.
In the aim of encouraging encounters and synergies that are necessary to the export of these projects on the international level and the career development of the artists, Kultur | lx will organise a speedmeeting session and a lunch between international guests and local professionals and artists.
Click here to discover the full line-up of Like A Jazz Machine.