After battling and jazzing it out over the last few months, the final 3 bands have been selected for the death match that is more calmly known as the ZKB Jazzpreis Finale. This Friday at Moods all 3 jazz ensembles will be playing for you and the judges, and one will be crowned Swiss jazz kings 2012. My personal tips for the top are the Kaleidoscope String Quartet, not wholly classical or jazz, they combine elements of pop, rock and jazz as well as creating groovy rhythms and beats with their instruments.
Friday 8 pm, Moods

We all get the urge to do our bit for the planet occasionally but sometimes, at least for me, recycling plastic bottles and turning off the tap when I brush my teeth just doesn’t always seem enough. Well this weekend saving the planet has never been easier with the Zürcher Umwelttage (Zurich Environmental Day). Spread across the city are nearly 50 events related to sustainable living, environment and health. All will give you ideas for how to live a more environmentally friendly lifestyle and in the process make you feel good about yourself too. That sounds like a pretty good weekend to me.
Friday and Saturday, All day at various locations

Festival fever is starting to heat up as the summer gets warmer and this weekend is an early chance to ease yourself into the chaos with the Stolze Openair. It’s Zurich’s largest, free music festival but is within the city limits and is easy to get to with public transport. The line-up is a good mix of local and international bands including Stereo Total, Coldeve and Fatboy.
Friday 5.30 pm and Saturday 10 am, Stolze Openair

I always like to find a good market to browse around at the weekends. Nothing says Saturday afternoon quite like rummaging for bargains and getting a 2-franc discount. This Saturday, Bazar im Stall 6 will be opening for business. It’s a vintage and designer market that will be showcasing some great Swiss labels. Food, drinks and djs will be on hand to keep your shopping powers up and if you need somewhere to show-off your beautiful new purchases, the market after-party by Mucho Mundo will be available in the evening.
Saturday 12 pm, Stall 6

If you’re an artist like Elvis Costello and your back catalogue stretches back decades to the early days of punk, it must take a lot of effort putting together a tour and filtering a set-list that keeps everyone happy, whether old school or just casual fans. Well, welcome to his Spinning Songbook tour at Kongresshaus. On stage Elvis uses a huge spinning carnival wheel with random songs and suggestions painted on. Crowd members spin, Elvis and the band play whatever is landed on. Everyone’s a winner.
Monday 8 pm, Kongresshaus

Information has the power to change individuals as well as the world, but for too long data and knowledge have been chained inside spreadsheets or academic books. The website informationisbeautiful hopes to change that by beautifully visualising data using a minimum of words. Whether you’re interested in the hierarchy of digital distractions or of reducing your odds of dying in a plane crash, this site will graphically explain it all.

As an English speaking person you may well be learning German to blend seamlessly into our Swiss brethrens world but did you know that each year hundreds of words disappear, unused and forgotten, from the English language. To try and stop this negative flow, the website savethewords has a freakshow full of unusual or exotic words that you can personally adopt, promising to use and keep them alive. If you do I’m sure you’ll be highly celeberrimous among your friends and certainly won’t be regarded as a foppotee.

Sounding like a blissed-out Sade who has discovered the summer joys of electropop, 110% by Jessie Ware warms you on the inside, while the sunshine will do the rest.