Partners
Montreux Sounds SA
Founded in 1967 by Claude Nobs, the Montreux Jazz Festival has become an absolute must for music fans over the years, both in Switzerland and abroad. All the greats have performed on the festival’s various stages, from Miles Davis to Ray Charles, through to David Bowie and Massive Attack. Jazz music may have constituted the Festival’s historic roots, but other musical styles quickly found their place within the festival, sharing a common bond of musical curiosity and mutual enthusiasm. Distinguishing itself by its ambitious programming choices, the Montreux Jazz Festival offers an ideal platform for musicians in an intimate setting.
The Montreux Jazz Festival library is the largest testimony of live music recorded on the same stage (more than 4’000 bands played in Montreux), both in audio and video with the best state of the art technologies available at the time, for the past 40 years. Montreux Sounds SA, founded in 1973 by Claude Nobs and owner of the Montreux Jazz Festival archives has also acquired a large collection of television footage for worldwide use. The 1991, 1992, 1993, 1997, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 editions of the festival were recorded in High Definition TV. With permission from the artists and their record companies, some of the performances are being released on DVD, CD and Blu-ray. Eagle Rock’s “Live at Montreux” series debuted in November 2004 and has already captured 80 major artists including shows dating back to the 1960s.
The Montreux Jazz Festival takes place every year, the first two weeks of July. With a budget of 18 Million CHF, and 1250 staff, the 2008 edition produced 10 Scenes, and allowed 220’000 visitors and 630 journalists to enjoy 16 days of concerts in a unique and unparalleled experience: more than 330 groups performed on the different stages, 209 of them on free venues.
EPFL
EPFL is one of the two federal universities (Ecoles Polytechniques Fédérales) in Switzerland. It has three missions: education, research and technology transfer at the highest international level. EPFL, in its idyllic location on the shores of Lake Geneva, brings together a campus of more than 10,000 people. Next to its reputed education programs in engineering, basic and life sciences, and architecture, EPFL has put a strong emphasis on a world class research and technology transfer. With more than 250 laboratories and research groups on campus, EPFL is one of Europe’s most innovative and productive technology institutes. The School’s unique structure facilitates transdisciplinary research and encourages partnerships with other institutions.
EPFL emphasizes both fundamental research and engineering applications. The campus offers services and facilities to transform scientific excellence into economic competitiveness, jobs and quality of life. A start-up incubator, coaching services, study programs in entrepreneurship, and innovation programs all serve to stimulate the links between lab and business. The Science Park on campus is home to more than 100 enterprises and numerous investors.
Among various centers of excellence, EPFL enjoys a team of world renowned experts in the field of media technologies and multimedia signal processing, making it one of the largest centers in these fields worldwide. Through years EPFL experts have been successful in inventing some of the key technologies behind today’s products and services in multimedia, both in consumer and professional fields. Examples of such achievements include MPEG family of standards used in DVD, Digital TV, Digital HDTV, and Mobile Multimedia, the JPEG 2000 standard used in multimedia archival and digital cinema, as well as digital surround sound.