Born 1954, lives in Biel, Switzerland; electric and acoustic cello, sampling, electronics.
Martin Schütz is a cellist and electronic musician, improvisor and composer. He has been a figure on the european scene of improvised music since the late 1980s and has played with a large variety musicians from Europe, USA and elsewhere.
He has been a regular collaborator with Lawrence Butch Morris, worked in trios with Barre Phillips and Hans Burgener and with Stephan Witter and Paul Lovens but has perhaps become best known for his membership of the Swiss trio "Koch-Schütz-Studer" - with Hans Koch and Fredy Studer - and its "Hardcore Chambermusic". The three musicians have been working together since 1990. Characteristics of their music are hard contrasts, even contradictions. Sequenced sounds from various unrecognisable sources and the use of live-electronics create dense walls of sound which are contrasted with completely acoustic, minimalistic-ambient improvisations. Analogue ("played") and digital ("programmed") beats are juxtaposed against free "outer-limits" - improvisations. In addition to working as a trio, the group has collaborated with traditional musicians with quite different non-western musical backgrounds: with the El Nil Troop from Egypt to record Heavy Cairo traffic, and with Cuban musicians to record Fidel. In 1998 the trio started a new group called "Roots&Wires" with New-York-DJs I-Sound and M.Singe.
Martin Schütz also works regularly with music in other media. He has a long working relationship with theatre director Christoph Marthaler, having collaborated with him in 1994 at the Schauspielhaus Hamburg and in 1996/97 at the Volksbühne in Berlin. He has composed and produced music for the Tanzwerk Nürnberg and Neumarktheater, Zurich and his work for film and video includes Peter Lüthi's computer animation Clowntown (1994), and for two films by Peter Liechti: Grimsel, ein Augenschein (1990) and the feature film Martha's Garten (1997).
e-mail: schuetzdoshi-music@bluewin.ch