Musical background

Claudia began her musical journey studying piano at Geneva Conservatory of Music and grew up listening to Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Ike and Tina Turner, The Temptations, Stevie Wonder and John Coltrane. 

She knew very early that in order to play the music of her childhood heroes she needed to find a teacher who could introduce her to blues, jazz, rock, soul, funk and so on. 

She started taking lessons with Geneva jazz pianist Henri Chaix (Sydney Bechet, Ben Webster, Buck Clayton, Benny Carter). 

She also attended jazz-rock workshops led by guitar player Philippe Dragonetti who greatly encouraged her towards her musical quest. At that time she was singing and performing in numerous bands, opening for Salif Keita and French singer Francis Lalanne. 

Then she decided to go to the US and study at Berklee School of Music, Boston, where she majored in Song-writing. 

In Boston she performed in jazz, funk, blues, rock and ska bands and recorded her own original songs with guitar player Rubens De La Corte (Angélique Kidjo), and bass player Derek Nievergelt (Terence Blanchard, Dianne Reeves, Diana Krall, Cassandra Wilson). 

She studied song-writing with Jack Perricone (who wrote for artists such as Jerry Butler, Michael Jackson and Lou Rawls). 

At the end of her studies, she had the good fortune to meet two of her many music heroes, jazz singer Nancy Wilson and singer-.songwriter Sting, who both made a great impact on her musical development. 

Back in Geneva, Claudia met Ismaël Rodriguez and worked with him in jazz-rock and salsa bands. They founded the group Blues Blend with which they perform in Switzerland, France, Spain and Senegal. The band has recorded three CD’s and is looking forward to the next one! 

Claudia also performs as a jazz vocalist in a duet format with three different guitar players, Blues Blend’s Marc Polliand, Andreas Fulgosi and Nestor Demopoulos. She is working on a French song-writing project and teaches piano and song-writing.