The Clash Trio is an ensemble dedicated to the interpretation and development of works for three percussionists. It was founded in June 2020 by three students from the University of Music in Freiburg im Breisgau (David Auli Morales, Javier Verduras and Timothée de La Morinerie).
The aim of the ensemble is to juxtapose works from different cultural backgrounds and thus bring them into dialogue with each other. As a chamber ensemble, the Clash Trio strives to develop a new repertoire that includes music theatre, electronic music and traditional music from different regions. To this end, the ensemble works closely with composers.
Special performances include the newcomer concert of Mehrklang (May 2022), at the Darmstadt Summer Courses (August 2023) and at the Dimension Percussion Festival in Strasbourg (December 2023). In June 2022, the trio was awarded fourth place in the Percussive Arts Society International Percussion Ensemble Competition. In September 2022, the ensemble won first prize at the Swiss Percussion Competition.
The ensemble's repertoire includes works by Cage, Xenakis, Waring, Applebaum, Huber, Cangelosi, Sadeler, Löffler and Soto Mayorga.
Born in Suances (Cantabria) in 1998, Javier Verduras las Heras began his musical training in 2006 at the Conservatorio Profesional de Torrelavega, collaborating in various interdisciplinary projects, such as the creation of the batukada group ‘Iroko’ or various musical productions with circus schools.
He later completed his university studies at the Conservatorio Superior de Música de Castilla y León (COSCYL), where he received percussion lessons from Tomás Martín, Alejandro Coello, Manuel Pérez and Noè Rodrigo. In the academic year 2019/2020 he received an Erasmus+ scholarship at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg (Germany) under the direction of Håkon Stene and Bernhard Wulff.
During these studies he worked with various orchestras, including OSCyL, JOL, JOSCAN, EMCS, TACOS, OHMF, and formed various ensembles and chamber music groups with which he experiments and performs various international concerts and competitions (JStroke Duo, Clash Trio, ICE3 Ensemble). His repertoire ranges from classical to contemporary music, including experimental music, post-percussion pieces, techno and research in the field of music theatre (with particular attention to the relationship between humour and music).
He has worked closely with composers such as Pierre Jodlowski, Simon Steen Andersen, Benjamin Scheuer, Helena Cánovas, David Bird, Maximiliano Soto, Kaley Seehan, Øyvind Torvund (among others), participated in various projects and performed new works.
In February 2023 he completed his Master's degree in Interpretation (Percussion) at the Freiburg University of Music and currently works as a freelance musician in Europe and teaches at the Hochschwarzwald Music School.
Percussionist David Auli Morales (*1992) comes from Venezuela and was trained in the social-musical movement ‘El Sistema’. He was a member of the Symphonic Orchestra of Caracas, in which he was active from 2012 to 2016. With this orchestra he travelled to Europe, Asia, North and South America and worked with renowned conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel and Leon Botstein, among others.
In 2021 and 2023, he completed his bachelor's and master's degrees in percussion, both at the University of Music in Freiburg im Breisgau. He is currently studying for a Master's degree in New Music Interpretation at the same conservatory. His work centres on the search for points of contact between early, traditional and new music. In this context, he has also collaborated with many composers and is involved in the promotion of the Venezuelan national instrument, the maracas, both artistically and pedagogically. Other characteristics of his artistic profile are music theatre, electronic music and improvisation, both free and historical.
In addition to his studies, he works as a freelance musician in various ensembles and orchestras. He is co-founder of the ensemble Tammurriata (music of the Spanish viceroyalties and its gradual transformation into South American folk music), the Duo Intakt (early and new music for recorder and percussion, as well as performance and music theatre) and the Clash Trio (percussion repertoire, electronic music, performance).
During his studies, he was awarded the Deutschlandstipendium scholarship several times (2021-2022 and 2022-2023). He was also a scholarship holder of the Helene Rosenberg Foundation (2017-2018) and an intern at the Freiburg Philharmonic Orchestra (2018-2019). Since 2019, David Auli Morales has been an honorary member of the Pro Venezuela association (humanitarian aid), where he organises various cultural activities. Since February 2023 he has been a scholarship holder of the association ‘Live Music Now’ Freiburg with the duo Intakt. Since March 2023 he has been a scholarship holder of the Kunststiftung Baden-Württemberg. In November 2023 he received the DAAD scholarship in the ‘STIBET I’ funding programme.
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Foto: Renate Warnecke
The French percussionist Timothée de La Morinerie studied percussion with Jean Baptiste Couturier at the Conservatoire de Tours (France).
After completing his Bachelor's degree at the Pôle Supérieur Paris Boulogne-Billancourt (PSPBB) in the class of Christophe Bredeloup, and his Master's degree at the Musikhochschule of Freiburg im Breisgau (Germany), he is currently studying for a Master's degree in New Music with Prof. Håkon Stene, Prof. Bernhard Wulff, Prof. Taijiro Miyazaki and Tilmann Collmer.
His interests lie in a variety of musical genres such as chamber music, contemporary music, improvisation and orchestral music. This boundless passion has led him to play in many projects with renowned musicians, including the orchestra Les Siècles conducted by François Xavier Roth, the Raschèr Saxophone Quartet, Ensemble Recherche and Ensemble Scope. He develops a large part of his artistic work together with his percussion trio, the Trio Clash, with Javier Verduras las Heras and David Auli Morales.
Bientôt le Trio