Stijn Cools plays drums and composes in a wide range of styles, preferably linked to
improvised music. He works as a
sound designer/electronic musician, and he plays the drums as well as many eastern percussion instruments. Experimenting with rhythm and sound, and the interest in clear artistic concepts are great sources for his artistic development. His diploma in architecture and scenography makes an important contribution to his thinking and developments in the musical field. Recently Stijn also started to dedicate himself to audio production (recording/mixing/mastering). In 2009 he won the “Gent Jazz talent prize”, in 2010 the “Toots Thielemans Jazz Award” at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. In the Summer of 2016, he won another Gent Jazz prize with the band Hoera, on behalf of the Gent Jazz Festival. Together with his brother Bert Cools, Stijn founded the art platform and art production house Granvat on www.granvat.com. With Granvat they created a house for their projects and collaborations with fellow artists. It also contains work by internationally respected artists:
Hariprasad Chaurasia, Solo Sissoko, Eyvind Kang. Stijn Cools is the composer and co-founder of the
Book of Airseries.
Bert Cools speaks music from his childhood with the guitar as medium and driving force. He receives the Dutch Erasmus Award for “best musician” (2010) and graduates cum laude at the conservatory in Rotterdam. With the band Hoera. they won the Gent jazz price in 2016. In addition to composing for various projects, Bert performs concerts all over the world (India, Mexico, NY, Europe, China, Taiwan, Japan etc.) with his own bands and projects (Merope, Hoera., Book of Air Vvolk & Fieldtone, JK's Kamer).
