PlayTime
Based in Geneva, the Ensemble PlayTime is a young contemporary music ensemble eager to explore new sounds. It is formed by Jose Nisa Velasco (saxophone), Ingrid Bidet (flute), Juliette Dournaud (piano), Loïc Morin (percussion) and Nicolas Roulive (composition / electronics).
Passionate about contemporary creation, they are determined to play the music of composers of their generation, and to work with them from the conception of the pieces to their live performances. They currently collaborate with composers Jaouen Rudolf (France) and Sergei Leonov (Russia).
Their work is mainly oriented around mixed music pieces, the use of electronics being for them a way to create an immersive experience and to set no limits in their experimentations.
In 2022, the Ensemble PlayTime received the Jean-François Chaponnière, prize from the HES-SO Geneva (Switzerland). This prize is awarded to a particularly brilliant chamber music ensemble within the Haute Ecole de Musique of Geneva. in 2023 they were awarded for their project PlayHouse by the Ponticello Association with OSEZ! Prize, destined to an innovative artistic project.
The ensemble's repertoire also includes pieces written in the 20th and 21st centuries (P. Jodlowski, R. Carvajal Pardo, S. Leonov, Jaouen Rudolf, N. Roulive, M. Wettl). In May 2022, they collaborated with Pierre Jodlowski in a concert dedicated to his works.
Apart from making the creation of pieces, the Ensemble PlayTime's vocation is to invite and collaborate with artists, musicians, video artists, plasticians, dancers or even actors. They would like to create performances born from the meeting between the artistic ideas of their guests and the identity of the collective. They wish to offer the audience poetic, multidisciplinary and engaged moments, and offer an immersion in new sound and sensory worlds.
Quatuor Amapola
The Quatuor Amapola was born of a meeting at the Haute École de Musique de Genève between Jose Nisa, Ana Parejo, Jocelyn Erard, Valentin Arrayet, and composer Peter Eötvös during a collaboration on his quartet, Lectures différentes. This experience encourages the group to delve into and explore the chamber music repertoire, offering music in which they exploit the group's artistic possibilities to the full.
Already rich in encounters, Amapola has been able to share its universe of sound with many audiences: at the Festival Ma Région Virtuose (Les Herbiers), at the Swiss Chamber Music Festival (Frutigen), at the 30th anniversary of the Geneva Chamber Orchestra at the Bâtiment des Forces Motrices (Geneva), at the Fête de la Musique (Geneva and Confignon), at the Paléo Festival (Nyon) and also in collaboration with the Musée des Beaux Arts in Le Locle. The quartet is also keen to share its music with audiences who don't have the opportunity to visit a traditional concert hall: they have thus shared their music with residents of the Psychiatric Hospital in Annecy and residents of the EMS Les Charmettes and the Hôpital du Beau Séjour in Geneva.
The quartet also worked closely with Noémie Bialobroda, Hans Egidi, Joshua Hyde, Ties Mellema and Pierre-Stéphane Meugé at the Haute École de Musique de Genève. Amapola was also invited to take part in the European Creative Academy - Annecy in the summer of 2022.
Despite their recent formation, they were awarded the prestigious ORPHEUS Swiss Chamber Music Competition 2022.