Where music connects.
Our soundscape
For us, early music is not a relic of the past but a living language of today. With passion and curiosity, Ensemble Ad Fontes draws inspiration from historical performance practice – not as a set of rules, but as a source of freedom. It opens the door to improvisation, personal expression, and sound colors that speak directly to the heart.
What unites us is more than our love of music: it is also the friendship we share. This special bond brings an energy that turns every rehearsal into a celebration and every concert into a memorable experience.
What inspires us currently
At the center of our work lies Horizonte, our own concert series in Basel since 2017. It has become both our laboratory and our place of discovery. Here we create imaginative programs where early music is interwoven with fresh ideas: world premieres and our own arrangements encounter actors and texts, even touching on folk traditions. In this way, our concerts do more than sound – they tell stories, surprise, and connect.
Where it all began
The core members of the ensemble – Anne Simone, Bruno and Mojca – first met at the University of the Arts in Bern, where they discovered a shared passion for early music. In 2010 they founded what is now Ensemble Ad Fontes, originally under the name Les Elémens.
The ensemble soon gained international recognition: at the Telemann Competition in Magdeburg (2013) it was awarded the Bärenreiter Urtext Prize. That same summer, Ad Fontes won both the First Prize and the Audience Prize at the Maurizio Pratola Festival for Early Music in L’Aquila (Italy). Shortly afterwards, the group was selected as one of the “most promising ensembles of 2014” for the International Young Artists Presentation (IYAP) in Antwerp, part of the renowned Laus Polyphoniae Festival.
Where Our Music Has Taken Us
Concert tours have taken Ad Fontes across Switzerland, Germany, Italy, Belgium, and Slovenia. The ensemble has performed at Young Euro Classics (Berlin), with the Solisti Aquilani (Italy), at the SEVIQC Brežice Festival (Slovenia), the Freunde Alter Musik Basel, the Potsdam Sanssouci Festival, the Seville Guitar Festival, Musica Antigua Winterthur, the Forum Alte Musik Zürich, as well as the Radovljica Festival and the Abendmusiken Olten.
In its own projects, Ad Fontes continues to explore new artistic paths. Collaborations with the dance company Chorea Basileae led to productions such as Dornröschen (2016), Of Kings, Gods and Demons (2018), and the ballet-pantomime The Ninth Muse (2019).