Franco Ambrosetti (photo by Massimo Pedrazzi)

Trumpeter Franco Ambrosetti has been named the winner of the Swiss Jazz Award for 2018, in recognition of his life in music.  The 76-year-old trumpet and flugelhorn player has been a mainstay on the European jazz scene since he first started performing professionally at clubs in Italy and Switzerland when he was 20 years old.  A native of Ticino, Ambrosetti has recorded over two dozen albums as a leader and was also a radio programmer for Ticino Radio RSI for over 30 years.  He has performed with Cannonball Adderley, Dexter Gordon and Joe Henderson, as well as with fellow Swiss jazzers Daniel Humair and George Gruntz.

Ambrosetti will be presented with the award on June 24 at the JazzAscona Festival in Ascona, Switzerland.

The Swiss Jazz Award was set up in 2007 by Radio Swiss Jazz in partnership with JazzAscona and was originally intended as a public choice award to promote the Swiss jazz scene.  It moved to a juried award in recent years. Previous winners of the award include Bruno Spoerri (2018), Patrick Bianco’s Cannonsoul (2016), Raphael Jost and lots of horns (2015), Nicole Herzog & Stewy von Wattenwyl (2014), Chris Conz Trio (2013), Christina Jaccard & Dave Ruosch (2012), Alexia Gardner (2011) and Dani Felber Big Band (2010). Lifetime Achievement Awards have been presented to Hazy Osterwald (2009) and Pepe Lienhard (2006).

The jury for the Swiss Jazz Award was:
Beat Blaser (music editor, Radio SRF 2 Kultur)
Rebecca Bretscher (Festival da Jazz, St. Moritz)
Andrea Engi (President, Jazz Club Chur and swissjazzorama)
Nicolas Gilliet (Head of JazzAscona)
Pepe Lienhard (musician)
Sai Nobel (music editor, Radio Swiss Jazz)
Mirko Vaiz (Project Leader music of Migros Culture Percentage, Federation of Migros Cooperatives)

For more information about the JazzAscona festival, visit their  http://www.jazzascona.ch/en/" rel="nofollow - website .

from https://jazztimes.com