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Become part of the Basstival 2025

Do you want to be part of the Basstival on September 20, 2025? Then don't wait any longer!

Simply register using the registration form and secure your place for this special event.

The participation fee is €30.00 per person. This gives you full access to the exhibition, exciting workshops, and all the concerts throughout the day. You can look forward to a vibrant mix of music, art, and creative impulses – there will definitely be something for everyone.

In the evening, there will be a delicious barbecue for all participants and artists, offering a great opportunity for relaxed conversations and networking. Drinks will be included throughout the day.

Basstival is not only a chance to experience music, but also to connect with like-minded people, build new contacts, and immerse yourself in a lively, creative atmosphere. Whether you're a participant, artist, or simply a music lover – everyone is warmly welcome!

We’re already excited for an unforgettable, musical day with you and can’t wait to meet lots of amazing people. Be there and let’s have a great time together!

Your Basstival-Team

David Sutkin is a seasoned bass player from Brooklyn, New York, with over 40 years of experience holding down the low end. He is the bassist for Apollo’s Ghost, an instrumental alt-rock trio with four albums to their name. Over the years, David has toured, recorded, and collaborated with musicians from around the world, always bringing his signature groove and deep musicality to every project.

In addition to his passion for performing, David is the founder of Bass Upfront, a thriving online community dedicated to all things bass. With over 30,000 members, including bassists, luthiers, and gear makers, it serves as a vibrant meeting place for players of all levels—from seasoned professionals to those just picking up their first bass. Through his music and community leadership, David continues to inspire and support the global bass-playing community.

He recorded his first solo album in 1994. Since then, 25 solo albums have been released, including Pilichowski Band Live
concert releases on DVD. The total circulation of all albums has exceeded 100,000 copies.

Since the beginning of his work as a musician, he very often plays in other artists’ projects. As a session musician, he has recorded over 250 albums, and their total sales amount to over 6 million copies. His sound can be heard on hundreds of albums released over the last three decades.

For many years, Wojtek has been invited around the world to all the major festivals, including Bass Player Live New York and Los Angeles, Euro Bass Days Verona, UK Bass Day, Java Jazz Festival, Open Jazz Fest, Klaipeda Jazz FesDval.

In total 16 times, he was recognized as the best Polish bass player. Winner of the Guitar Awards 2013 in the category Best Bassist category. For many years he has been giving music lectures and master classes all over the world.

Remco Hendriks is a Dutch bassist best known for his performance videos of original bass compositions, released online on Remco’s Groove Lab. With 233K subscribers on YouTube, an extensive career in trade shows, solo performances, clinics and recording sessions, Remco is a household name in the industry. His signature “Lobster Claw” fingerstyle has been acknowledged as innovative and inspiring, as well as his experimental fretless funk rock compositions.

Remco is a member of LA funk supergroup The Big Ol’ Nasty Getdown, the Groove Lab Trio, and plays and records with legendary drummer Jack Irons (RHCP/Pearl Jam). New music released this summer will be performed at BASSTIVAL, get ready for Remco’s Groove Lab!

Starting out in the mid 1970's Jonas Hellborg has played bass with and for some of the greatest guitarist and drummers of modern music. Names as John McLaughlin, Shawn Lane, Buckethead, Mattias IA Eklundh, Ginger Baker, Michael Shrieve, Billy Cobham, Tony Williams, Jeff Sipe, V. Selvaganesh, Reebop Kwaku Baah to name just a few in no particular order.

He pioneered the idea of solo performances on electric bass as early as 1977 and has performed western classical music as well as collaborated with Indian musicians in various cross over projects.

Bruno Tauzin is a passionate educator and the author of over 76 bass method books published by Play-Music. Since 2005, he has been helping bass players of all levels progress with seriousness, efficiency, and enjoyment.

His website, BasseBruno.com, features a free lesson channel that has become the #1 reference in France, with over 20 million views and 113,000 subscribers on YouTube, along with a Facebook community of over 20,000 bassists.

His method books are used daily by thousands of students, and he has led more than 17 masterclasses across France. He also teaches private lessons, both in person and online.

Since 2018, he has been collaborating with Maruszczyk to design his own signature bass models.

Also a composer, his instrumental music is available on all streaming platforms.
In 2023, he launched ProfdeBasse.com, the go-to platform for learning bass online, offering the same high-quality teaching as his private lessons.

Bo Waterschoot is a professional freelance bassist with over 30 years of experience. Her passion for the bass guitar has led her to explore and master many variations of the instrument — 4, 5, and 6 strings, both fretted and fretless.

Equally at home in a wide range of musical genres, Bo finds joy in every project as long as she gets to play her favorite instrument. Her versatile career includes folk with Kv Express, metal with Silent Utopia, and contemporary music with I.T.T.E at the Royal Opera of La Monnaie, among many others.

She is also the musical director of the French world premiere production of the hit musical Come From Away.
Recently, Bo recorded a jazz album with the Bruno Castellucci Legacy Quartet, and a genre-defying album with the Johan Dupont Trio.

Slawek Semeniuk is a versatile bassist with over 30 album credits to his name. He has toured extensively with renowned blues-rock artists like Rob Tognoni and Wolf Mail, recently joining Krissy Matthews and collaborating with a wide range of international talents like Heidi Solheim, Dani Wilde and Kim Jennett.
A longtime student of Adrian Maruszczyk, Semeniuk remains active both as a performer and session player. His solo work blends fusion, Slavic folk, and progressive influences.

Stefan Huth, a touch guitarist, has been active in the world of touchstyle instruments for over 25 years. These instruments are played with two-handed tapping.

His musical roots lie in progressive rock and heavy metal, but he has also explored Indian and other world music. He has been part of Touch Guitars since 2013 and CEO since 2020.

In addition to his musical career, in which he has collaborated with renowned artists such as Markus Reuter, Tony Levin, Eivind Aarset, Yogev Gabay, Andi Pupato, Stephan Thelen, Nina Hagen, Mars Williams, Nippy Noya, David Torn, and Andy West, he regularly gives demonstrations and courses internationally based on the Touch Guitar Circle learning concept, which was developed specifically for the instrument. As a solo artist, he prefers a quieter, acoustic style.

Mery's Key are an unlikely duo of female voice & bass guitar masquerading as pop music. Imagine how Newton Faulkner brought alternative guitar playing styles into pop music, but with a bass guitar instead and a female singer in the vein of Natalie Imbruglia or Natasha Bedingfield.

Although Kevin Reginald Cooke has been writing for bass and vocals as far back as 2007, performing with star bassists such as Seth Horan, Steve Lawson and Yolanda Charles, together with singer Mery Bertòs the duo was formed at the beginning of 2021 and debuted at the G.Modena Theatre in Palmanova, hand-picked to provide musical entertainment during the life-time career award presentation for Italian journalist Enrico Mentana, and have since begun a collaboration with producer Matthew Parisi (Shayne Ward, Luna Blue, Nobody's Wolf Child) to fulfil their vision of being able to build songs from the bass and vocals up in such a way that the music can be appreciated far beyond the audience of their niche.

For 40 years and counting, I've been putting my heart into music and everything related with it. I've had the opportunity to use a variety of different instruments, amps and other gear during live shows and studio work. Thanks to extensive testing and research, I collected a great deal of experience in the areas of tone woods, pickups, hardware and strings.

The knowledge I collected during those years allowed me to create musical instruments, amplifiers and accessories for the working musician whose functionality, tone and price/performance ratio are second to none. The constant development and improvement of my products will always remain my top priority.

Stradi by Marek Dąbek, expertly crafted by a master luthier, each instrument is an original creation of the finest materials, delivering exceptional sound and timeless artistry.

A master luthier since 2002, Marek creates electric upright basses, electric violins, and bass guitars, blending his expertise in stringed instruments and innovative pickup designs for a unique approach to each creation. Agnieszka, Marek's life and business partner, has been with Stradi from the start. After leaving her corporate career, she joined him in the workshop, where her focus on detail and precision ensures that every instrument meets the highest standards. Together, they craft instruments that combine technical excellence with artistic expression.

Possessing eight or ten strings and covering a range of just over five octaves, Touch Guitars® are highly dynamic universal instruments. They function equally well in melodic or chordal roles and are more than capable of performing both functions simultaneously. Crucially, although Touch Guitars® are specifically designed for the polyphonic two-handed touchstyle approach (familiar from the work of Michael Hedges, Tony Levin, Eddie Van Halen, Stanley Jordan, Tosin Abasi, Trey Gunn and many others, including Markus himself) they are equally suitable for all other existing guitar, bass guitar and lute techniques – plectrum picking, fingerpicking, strumming, slapping and beyond.

Luthier traditions regarding instruments in Poland's southernost region of Podhale have been continuously alive for a very long time. In the second half of the 20th century, Nowy Targ had a school for violin-makers, which educated many excellent craftsmen. Till this day, the Kenar High School in Zakopane is offering a class in that field, where many young people can pursuit the excellence in that field. Since over half a decade, our region has been home to many brands, specializing in creating custom guitars and basses.

Therefore, in order to keep the tradition alive and joined by a team of excellent luthiers - we have created Mensinger. We take a lot of pride in quality and execution of each instrument.

I started as a professional bass and guitar builder/repairer around 1989 in my home workshop near Brussels, Belgium.

At 16, when studying electronics in school, I was inspired by a Donald Brosnac book and began experimenting by building some of my own very basic guitars, using whatever tools I could find in my father’s metal workshop. This opened up an exiting new world of guitar playing and the guitar making technique around it. Around this time, I was playing in bands and bought a few major brand guitars and basses. Never really satisfied with them, I began customizing my own gear. This evolved into an obsession and finally into a profession.

These days my designs are based on traditional styles. I try to mix them in a way that makes them look a bit different but feel like something players are used to. Playability, ergonomics, sound and looks are very important to me.

Years of playing, tweaking, repairing and building basses and guitars for a wide range of players have given me a good idea what works best in my designs. Creating an instrument that becomes a player’s musical voice is what it's all about.

All of my instruments are carefully-crafted- and reliable tools for musical creativity!

Sander de Gier built his first ‘guitar’ when still a kid. It was supposed to look like a Tele, although it was just a stick of wood with ropes. Good enough to start a band with other kids in the neighborhood. In his teens he tried to build a real guitar, but got stuck halfway. Information wasn’t as readily available as nowadays. In his early 20’s things became more serious and, after he had been working with another guitar maker for a while, he founded De Gier Guitars in 1996. From then on he just kept going, one guitar after another, one customer at a time. By now Sander has clients all over the world, many of which are professional players. It’s been an amazing journey of hardships and rewards. Let’s build another one!

My name is Fred and I’ve been obsessed with basses and guitars since childhood. When I was 15 years old I quit classical schooling to dedicate myself to my passion : lutherie. Since then, and for the last 14 years my curiosity, and research for innovative, modern, and ergonomic instruments grew on.

Meta means “after” or “beyond”, and when combined with other words, meta often signifies “change” or “alteration”. It is with this concept in mind that I have pursued and developed my creative and artistic passion of making beautiful, unique, modern and innovative basses and guitars. As a luthier, and music lover, both sound quality and ergonomics are my primary concerns. The instruments should suit the musician’s requirements and become an extension of them and their art. Each instrument I create is entirely handmade using the most noble materials and the best components and hardware. It offers a depurate and ergonomic design, for the most demanding musicians.

From the initial piece of wood to the final instrument, the concept of transformation always guides me creatively. Throughout my process, I endeavour to express abstract concepts through shapes, materials and colors. I love creating fine pieces suiting each musicians requirement. The dynamic and slender shapes, the feeling of an unique object, and the comfort of the instrument are the key elements in every creation. Every model can be customized and carefully tailored to meet the artist’s needs.

Meta is an entire transformative process, a kind of alchemy.

The Basstival will take place at the headquarter of Public Peace/Maruszczyk Instruments.

Showroom and Headquarter Address:

Public Peace
Nikolausstr. 22
D-52457 Aldenhoven-Schleiden

Our showroom and headquarter are just 30 minutes by car from the tri-border region - Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.

Our location has a very good highway connection to the A4 and A44, so that you can reach us from larger cities such as Dusseldorf, Cologne or Maastricht in less than an hour by car. From the Aldenhoven highway exit it is only 2 minutes to the rural area Aldenhoven-Schleiden.

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