It has just been announced that the winner of the EUR 15,000 2011 Skoda Jazz Prize, which will be awarded at Jazzahead in Bremen on 29th April, is Claude Nobs, the founder of the Montreux Jazz Festival.
The prize will be presented to him by Siggi Loch of ACT Music. The friendship and business relationship of Claude Nobs and Siggi Loch goes back over 40 years. At the ceremony there will also be a homage to the Ertegun brothers. They were the key figures in getting the Montreux Festival off the ground oriinally in 1967, encouraging Nobs in his job at the time - as foreign representative of the Montreux Tourist Office - to found the festival.
The previous winners of the Skoda Prize have been:
2010 - John McLaughlin
2009 – Norma Winstone
2008 – Karsten Jahnke
2007 – Joe Zawinul
