©Julia Geiter
And that is the town of Bad Hall in Upper Austria where I was born into the Lacherstorfer family. My mum Elfriede, a teacher, loves to spend her leisure time either in her garden or playing the double bass. My dad Franz, also a teacher, collects pretty much everything he can get hold of – from Wilhelmsburger tableware to iron grave crosses, the latter of which he embeds in concrete in the yard. On top of that, he is a passionate bagpiper and hurdy gurdyist, a circumstance that caused one or the other rather ungentle morning for me and my sister Marlene.
And this is where my musical career starts. Inspired by my parents’ group “Kremsmünsterer Bock- und Leiermusik” and my grandfather’s accordion music, I desperately wanted to learn the violin by age 6. I was granted to do so. However, I did not have an all too professional approach towards practising back then. Instead, I listened to tons of CDs with yodellers, Wienerlied, Gstanzln, and Estonian bagpipe music. After some time I started feeling the urge to put everything I knew so far into practice.
First off, my family and I formed the band “Lacherstorfer Soatnkråtzer” – this roughly translates as “Lacherstorfer String-Scratchers” – and the name was not too far-fetched, I’m afraid. When I finally came to Vienna in 2003 to study music education, psychology, and philosophy, my musical visions started to materialise more and more: Retrieve long-forgotten traditional tunes and incorporate them in my own music, discover rare gems from all over the world and become familiar with them. Find people who know things I don’t know, so I know a bit more afterwards. Play music with people and create small worlds.
After some time of studying people, music , and life itself, a new passion has joined the aforementioned: improvisation. Because it gets you so very close – closer to yourself, closer to the people you play for, closer to the people you play with. Thus, I have come to the Linz Anton Bruckner Private University to study Jazz and improvised music with Andi Schreiber.
In a nutshell
Julia Lacherstorfer
*18.09.1985, raised and infected with folk music in Bad Hall, Upper Austria
- moved to Vienna in 2003
studies at the Vienna University and the University of Music and Performing Arts in musicology, pedagogy, musical education, violin, psychology, and philosophy - 2004 giving workshops in yodelling and folk music ensemble
- 2005 starting own folk music projects “Aufstrich” and “triovial” including concert activities
- 2009 numerous concerts
- 2010 studies at the Anton Bruckner Private University in jazz violin with Andi Schreiber, Peter Herbert, Christoph Cech etc.
- 2011 starting the projects “Alma” and “Ramsch und Rosen”
- 2014
_scholarship from the austrian government: STARTstipendium des BMUKK
now: freelance musician and composer in Austria and abroad - 2015:
_ Graduated with distinction (BA) in jazz and improvised music,
_ Composition for the vocal ensemble “Company of Music”,
_ 2nd place at the “Austrian World Music Awards” with ALMA - 2016:
_ Finalists in the promotion program of the BMEIA “The New Austrian Sound of Music” with Ramsch & Rosen (journeys to the USA, Canada, Armenia, Slovakia, Spain, etc.)
_ World premiere of the vocal piece “Metamorphoses” in the Mozart Hall of the Vienna Konzerthaus - 2017:
_Deutscher Weltmusik-Sonderpreis RUTH goes to ALMA
Discography
- “Goldapfel und Zaubergoaß” | fairy tales with Helmut Wittmann | ATS records, 2002
- “Brot” | Aufstrich | non food factory, 2008
- “Spiele” | Aufstrich | non food factory, 2010
- “eventuell!” | esmeraldas taxi | Bibliothek der Provinz, 2009
- “Bipolar” | Neuschnee | Problembär-Records, 2011
- “Drachenhaut und Rosenmund” | Märchen-CD mit Helmut Wittmann + Ramsch&Rosen” | ATS records, 2013
- “Nativa” | Alma | col legno, 2013
Bestenliste der “Deuschten Schallplattenkritik”, 4. Quartal 2013
- “Bellver” | Ramsch und Rosen | Lotus Records, 2014
- “Transalpin” | ALMA | col legno, 2015
- “Bergen” | Ramsch & Rosen | Lotus Records 2016
- Oeo | ALMA | col legno 2017
- Cherubim | ALMA | Trikont 2019
- Spinnerin [a female narrative] | Julia Lacherstorfer | Lotus Records 2020
Press
Renald Deppe, “Strenge Kammer”, Porgy&Bess 2013
“Julia Lacherstorfer is an incredibly versatile sound artist. Her musical oeuvre is characterized by a complete absence of stylistic boundaries. Abounding creativity and multifaceted curiosity are the ingredients of her musical energy and account for perpetual repositioning. However, her distinctive musical mindset is not subject to zeitgeisty world music vagueness, but deeply rooted in the traditional Austrian music. She takes the allegedly familiar, homely, and kitschy sounds to pieces and redefines her native music in a skillful and refreshing manner.”
Albert Hosp // Glatt & Verkehrt Festival (AT):
“Ramsch & Rosen are only few years old, and yet they already range amongst the most important innovators when it comes to integrating folk music into the present day, without employing unduly originality but rather creating an effortless sense of sound and enchanting ideas. With David Six and Lukas Kranzelbinder, two renowned musicians in the worlds of jazz, classical music, and pop complement the group. Any kind of genre pigeonholing is of course not applicable when this quartet goes on stage: David Six – born in Upper Austria and living in Vienna and Berlin – is playing the piano in the most imaginative, flowing, songlike, and energetic ways. And in 2012, he additionally started studying southern Indian percussion … Lukas Kranzelbinder is a local jazz hero himself whose music is setting free energies, and his experience as well as his stilistic diversity convince in equal measure.
Workshops
© Theresa Pewal
in the fields of folk music, improvisation and yodelling at the following institutions:
University of Music and Performing Arts (Vienna), Volksmusikakademie Lesachtal (Carinthia), Musikschulmanagement Lower Austria, KPH Krems, Volkskultur Lower Austria, BORG St. Pölten, Volksschule Zelking, Schrammel.Klang.Festival, Steirisches Volksliedwerk, Burgenländisches Volksliedwerk, artes iuventutis, Harald Haugaards International Fiddleschool (DK/DE), University of Limerick (IR), …