Le Pop La Série: Coline Rio

Coline Rio (piano, guitar) Laure Magnien (cello, vocals)

Tickets

For us, Coline Rio is right at the forefront of the new wave of French artists. Why? Because she writes songs like no one else, because her voice could melt rocks, because everything she does exudes an artistic and emotional intensity that’s second to none. Coline Rio was a guest in the Le Pop La Série series two years ago, and her performance left a lasting impression. In the meantime, her career in France has taken significant leaps forward. With her second album, “Maison,” the Nantes native finally managed to break away from her indie-pop past and establish herself even more firmly in the realm of classic chanson. This spring, Coline Rio appeared for the first time on the show “Taratata,” which is tantamount to the ultimate accolade for a newcomer to the chanson scene. And now she’s coming back to Cologne. Wow.

Further information

Venue:

Stadtgarten

The first concert in the newly built Stadtgarten concert hall in the mid-1980s launched a program unlike anything Germany had seen: an independent, artistically driven concert series devoted to contemporary improvised music. It was guided neither by attendance figures nor by public subsidies, yet it guaranteed musicians minimum fees and was run on professional terms. The conditions mattered just as much: an acoustically optimized, street-level concert space offering a strong setting for audiences and performers alike. Operations were financed through the adjoining hospitality business, the Stadtgarten restaurant and beer garden, a model that drew attention well beyond Germany.

Today the Stadtgarten Köln ranks among Europe's internationally recognized venues for contemporary and improvised music. The American magazine Down Beat features it regularly in its listings; it has received Germany's federal APPLAUS venue program award several times, including "Venue of the Year" in 2016, followed by the German Jazz Prize in the same category in 2022. More than 400 events across the full spectrum of contemporary music now take place there each year. Its international standing rests above all on the high proportion of demanding, experimental programming.

A programming mission of this kind depends on reliable public support. The venue's 30th anniversary in September 2016 opened that prospect: through a partnership between the City of Cologne and the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, programming work is being substantially strengthened, and from 2017 onward the Stadtgarten Köln is being developed step by step into a "European Center for Jazz and Contemporary Music" – with the goal of becoming one of Europe's leading music centers.

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