About the concert
The project Veda Bartringer Quartet came to life in 2021. During her years at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels, the guitarist assembled a lot of musical ideas, which she wanted to finally realize in compositions. She likes to include different musical genres in her compositions such as classical, funk, blues and Indian music.
Her studies in lyrical singing, classical guitar and piano give her the possibility to compose from different point of views and to search for different aspects in her music. The musicians Julien Cuvelier (saxophone), Boris Schmidt (double bass) and Maxime Magotteaux (drums) joined Veda in her musical journey and help realize her musical projects. The 3 musicians Veda, Julien and Maxime have met during their studies at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels. Veda has met Boris after one of her concerts and included him immediately in her project.
The guitarist proposes modern jazz sounds mixed with a feminine sensitivity that is uncommon in this music genre.
Veda Bartringer took an interest in music at a very early age. At the age of 8, she started learning the piano and only a few years after, she discovered the guitar. At 16, she started lessons in classical singing. These 3 instruments keep inspiring her to this day. At 17, she discovered the world of jazz. In Luxembourg, she took lessons with David Laborier, Jacque Pirotton, Pit Dahm, Pol Belardi and Erik Teuwens.
In 2017, she was accepted to the Royal Conservatory of Brussels to study Jazz Guitar. In 2022 she has completed the Bachelor degree and in 2022, she has finished the master’s degree in the same conservatory. During her 5 years of study, she had the chance to learn from the guitarists Victor Da Costa and Fabien Degryse and other musicians like Fabrice Alleman, Manu Hermia, Pete Churchill and Arnould Massart. The guitarist François Decamps also played an important role in her formation and showed her new ways of expressing herself.
The guitarist was introduced to different music cultures, such as Brazilian music, Indian music, but also fusion and funk music. She participates in various different Luxembourgish and Belgian projects, such as her duo with Joel Rabesolo, the project Lumens but also her own solo project
Julien Cuvelier is a young belgian jazz and pop saxophonist, clarinetist and flutist. He started to learn music at the age of 7 and never stopped since then. He joined at 15 the “west music club” conducted by Richard Rousselet and did lots of replacement for other Big Bands. He graduated from the Royal Conservatory of Brussels in 2020 after studying for 5 years with Fabrice Alleman and Manu Hermia.
During his studies he had the chance to meet and play with lots of wellknown Belgian jazzmen such as Pierre Vaiana, Bart de Nolf, Guy Cabay, Benoit Vanderstraeten, and he also had the chance to record his first album “moments”, as sideman in the project of Basile Rahola (double bass) with Pierre Hurty (drums) and Wajdi Riahi (piano).
In 2022 he won the price of the best soloist at the European Big Band Contest in Luxembourg. During the same year he recorded the EP The Butterfly Effect, a project of the Luxembourgish guitarist Veda Bartringer with the other musicians Boris Schmidt (double bass) and Maxime Magotteaux (drums).
Julien Cuvelier is also playing in some pop projects, such as by Tom Dewatt and Takfarinas.
Maxime Magotteaux is born in 1995 in Nivelles, Belgium and starts playing music at the age of 6. He starts with classical percussion and a few years later, he starts in jazz drums. Besides his formation at the music school in Nivelles, he follows lessons from several musicians such as Jacky Coppens, Michel Paré, François Decamps and Bernard Guyot.
In 2015, he is accepted at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels in jazz drums and for 6 years he learns from the drummers Thomas Grimmonprez and Thierry Gutmann. During his studies, he participates in different projects and plays on various belgian scenes such as the Jazz Station (Brussels), Music Village (Brussels), Botanique (Brussels), la Ferme du Biéreau (Louvain-La-Neuve). He played in various formations with belgian musicians like Druss Lecomte, Michel Paré, François Decamps.
He deepens his studies in jazz by learning from musicians like Manuel Hermia, Victor da Costa, Jean-Louis Rassinfosse, Antoine Pierre. Maxime plays in various different projects, he works on his own trio project and also participates in the Veda Bartringer Quartet.
Boris Schmidt was born in Luxembourg in 1983 and began playing music at the age of 7. He started out with saxophone, soon followed by piano and harmony. Starting in 1998 he attended jazz saxophone workshops in Rossignol (Belgium) with Alexandre Plumacker , Nicolas Dory, Jacques Pirotton and André Klenes as his first teachers.
Self-taught on electric bass since 1999, it was not until 2002 that he got started on doublebass, which was then taught to him by Marc Demuth. The double bass quickly became his instrument of choice, and from 2003 on, Boris has attended lessons at the Royal Conservatory of Den Haag (NL), studying with the likes of Hein van de Geyn, Frans van der Hoeven, Uli Glaszmann, John Ruocco and Eric Ineke and obtaining his bachelor of music degree in 2007.
He is now mainly active as a jazz musician in the Be-Ne-Lux area, but has also recorded and toured for 12 years with Grammy nominated early music group “l'Arpeggiata” to most prestigious venues like Walt Disney Concert Hall (Los Angeles), Wigmore Hall (London) or Carnegie Hall (New York). He also occasionally teaches jazz workshops in Belgium.
After 25 albums as a sideman his first production as a composer and leader entitled “Now” was released by Homerecords in 2018. In recent years while continuing his journey as a composer and bassist he has been diving deeper into the venezuelan tradition with teachers like Christobal Soto, Roberto Koch, Cheo Hurtado, Miguel Siso and Leo Rondon.
Musicians Boris has performed with include Erwin Vann, Michel Pils, Ro Gebhardt, Didier Lockwood, Eef Albers, Randy Brecker, Felix Simtaine, Steve Houben, Philippe Jaroussky, Wolfgang Muthspiel, Gianluigi Trovesi, Avi Avital, Leo Rondon, Barbara Fortuna …