Sophie Hunger – Beautiful indie pop with lots of poetry

Spring is coming, and with it comes the desire for music—new music, music you haven't heard before, and preferably something a little out of the ordinary. Classical music isn't in such high demand right now; winter offered plenty of opportunities to listen to more traditional music at concerts, in opera houses, or at festive occasions.

When the sun comes out again, new and fresh music is in demand, and those who are not satisfied with formatted music are now ready for new musical experiences somewhere between folk and pop, rock and blues.

Such a fresh experience could be conveyed to these people by the music of Sophie Hunger , beautiful indie pop with a lot of poetry in composition and voice, constantly changing, and always so fascinating that the “Spiegel” already speaks of the “great one from little Switzerland”.

Sophie Hunger was born there, on March 31, 1983, in Bern; her full name is Emilie Jeanne-Sophie Welti. Swiss art connoisseurs already prick up their ears at this family name, and indeed Emilie/Sophie is the great-grandniece of the well-known Swiss painter Albert Welti and the great-niece of the multi-award-winning painter and writer Albert Jakob Welti.

Radio pioneer and main speaker of Radio Zurich, actor and author Ernst Arthur Welti was her grandfather, and with her parents, or rather her father and diplomat Philippe Welti, Emilie got to know a good part of the world.

Emilie and her two older siblings grew up not only in their hometown of Zurich, but also in Bern, London and Bonn, and their musical influences were just as diverse: her father introduced her to his favorite jazz and punk, her mother interested her in the folk songs of the countries they lived in, and she also received piano lessons as a child.

The aspiring artist herself didn't commit to anything at first; as a teenager she devoured hip-hop and rhythm and blues, later she discovered rock music and still later folk, country and bluegrass.

In between, she completed her Matura (Abitur) at the Zurich Literary Gymnasium Rämibühl, studied English and German studies from 2003 and supported the experimental band Superterz of the Zurich electronics tinkerers Marcel and Ravi Vaid as a guest singer from 2002 to 2006 in the creation of their suddenly truly spherical sounds.

She can be heard on the Superterz album Standards from 2006, and also on the album “Fisher” by the indie rock band Fisher, which was released in the same year and to which she belonged as a singer from 2004.

Emilie Welti had sung for these bands , but with the decision to release her first solo CD, she felt ready for a stage name. Sophie Hunger was born, from her own middle name and her mother's maiden name, and this Sophie presented the CD "Sketches on Sea," which she had recorded herself at home.

The CD received more than favorable attention and helped Hunger secure interesting engagements: She played as the opening act for Stephan Eicher at the Bataclan in Paris in May 2007 and was invited as a guest to the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland in July 2007, where she performed with John Parish and Raphelson.

In August and September of the same year, she was already on international concert tours with the band “The Young Gods” and the jazz quartet Erik Truffaz.

Sometimes exceptional talent is indeed noticed in time: Sophie Hunger first performed in front of an audience at the age of 19, a few years later she was already quite well known in musical Europe, and at 25 she achieved her breakthrough: At the beginning of 2008 she recorded “Monday's Ghost”, her first studio album, and in June 2008 Universal Music offered her a contract.

That July, she played with her own band (consisting of bassist Balz Bachmann, multi-instrumentalist Christian Prader, trombonist Michael Flury, and drummer Alberto Malo) at the Montreux Jazz Festival to a sold-out crowd, and “Monday’s Ghost” went straight to the top of the Swiss charts. The album was released in Germany, Austria, and France in February 2009 and achieved platinum status.

Hunger then produced her second studio album “1983” herself in Paris with the help of sound engineer Stéphane Alf Briat; it almost goes without saying that “1983” also stormed the Swiss charts immediately after its release.

In 2010, the “1983” tour followed, during which they were the first Swiss band ever to perform at the Glastonbury Festival and played to sold-out audiences at the Miles Davis Hall in Paris as part of the Montreux Jazz Festival

In addition, Hunger composed the film music for Micha Lewinsky's film "Der Freund" in 2008 and played a supporting role in the film, wrote columns for "Die Zeit" in 2009 and a much-commented report on the Salzburg Festival in 2010, and won the SwissAward in the Show category in 2010.

In 2010 she also contributed the music to the documentary film “Room 202 – Peter Bichsel in Paris”, and in autumn/winter 2011 she reported in “Zeit online” about her America tour with the Malian Tuareg band Tinariwen.

To relax, Hunger sometimes paints cubist-style pictures, and for her third album “The Danger Of Light” (2012) she collaborated with well-known American musicians, e.g. Josh Klinghoffer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers; this collaboration gave her music a new and accentuated vibrancy.

All of this suggests that we can expect musical surprises from Sophie Hunger in the future, and if these are as enchanting as the results of her development so far, it will be worth listening closely again and again.

If you are planning a city break over the Easter holidays, perhaps to Innsbruck or Salzburg or Bratislava, or, depending on the date of the Easter holidays in your federal state, also to Prague, Linz, Solothurn, Aarau, Brugg, Schaffhausen, Biel/Bienne or Zug, you can hear Sophie Hunger live, she is visiting these places on her current tour.

Even if you are a skier and spend your Easter holidays in the Bernese Alps, Sophie Hunger will be playing and singing near you, on March 8, 2013 at the Caprices Festival, which takes place in Crans-Montana until March 16.