Biography
Laura Schuler was born 1987 in Switzerland, Langenthal (BE). Growing up in a musician family, she started to play the violin in the age of seven. After years of studying classical violin and the playing in youth orchestras she startet to be more interested in jazz and improvised music and studied jazz violin 2011 – 2013 at HKB in Bern. After that Laura did the Nomazz program (nordic master in jazz) in Denmark, Sweden and Finnland. In summer 2014 she got invited to the meeting of IASJ (International Association of Schools of Jazz), directed by David Liebman. Besides playing the violin and composing for different ensembles she started to sing while playing the violin.
Laura is now working as a freelance musician in various projects. As a solo artist she played various concerts in several countries (album release Elements And Songs in May 2018 by Veto Records). Since 2020 she produces and performs live under the name Kate Birch (album releases Sound Of The City in May 2020 and The Fool in April 2022). The pseudonym got created during several stays in New York. Trough this project Laura develops increasingly the technique of her voice, the writing of lyrics and the use of synthesizers. Also she produces and mixes the music by herself.
Further more, Laura leads the her quartet with Tony Malaby, Hanspeter Pfammatter and Lionel Friedli. As a Co-leader she is active in the trio Esche (with Luzius Schuler and Lisa Hoppe). Further she plays with the trio Kwestia (with Ronny Graupe and Alfred Vogel). 2014 - 2017 she worked with her quintet Kronikor, 2013 - 2016 with the band Aberratio Ictus (with Rea Dubach and Ronny Graupe). Between 2015 and 2019 Laura was part of Das Seltene Orchester, played various concerts and composed several pieces for the 12 person ensemble
Laura has worked and is still working with musicians such as Tony Malaby, Julian Sartorius, Hanspeter Pfammatter, Lionel Friedli, Ronny Graupe, Klas Nevrin, Rea Dubach, Luzius Schuler, Lisa Hoppe, Philipp Gropper, Alfred Vogel, Silvan Jeger, Lukas Rutzen, Sebastian Strinning, Elias Stemeseder, Nick Dunston and Jacob Sacks and she is touring in Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finnland, Norway, Austria, Belgium, Hungary and France.
She composes and plays live for dance productions ("Blue Marks, Red Spots" from Rahel Maria Neuenschwander, "Spiel der Wandlungen" with Annemarie Kaufmann and for the collective Bufo Makmal).
With her brother Luzius Schuler and the trumpet player Nicola Habegger, she founded the Färbi-Jazzfest, a festival in Langenthal Switzerland. This festival represents music from the creative, young music scene.
For her solo work she got a Werkstipendium of the city of Bern, this allowed her to spend three month in New York in 2019.
In July 2020 Laura won again a grant of the Kanton Bern for an artist atelier to spend half a year in New York.
2022 she got awarded with the Culture Prize of the city of Langenthal