Jeanruaz Group

Starting out on vocals, the Ladin* songwriter Jean-Daniel Granruaz, aka Jeanruaz, picked up his first guitar relatively late, at age 17. After his initial exposure to jazz and classical music in South Tyrol, he left to attend the Taller de Músics in Barcelona. He then left Europe in 2002 to pursue jazz studies in Argentina, where he also had more exposure to the Latin American experience and a combination of pop and ethnic sounds. This inspired his own mixing of styles and an eclectic approach to music. Jean was subsequently accepted by the jazz institute at the Accademia del Suonno in Milan, where he studied guitar under Bebo Ferra — and met his creative partners and bandmates Loris and Francesco Dallago.

Jean writes songs in Ladin, English and Italian, or a combination (A Safe Place). Sounds from the Ladin language, often considered Portuguese-like, are used (Perde) to create little muddles with the taste of samba or bossa nova.

* An old alpine Rhaeto-Romance language spoken by about 60,000 people, mainly in the Dolomite Mountains of Northern Italy.