Barbara Dennerlein (born 25 September 1964 in Munich)
is a German
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...
organist. She has achieved particular critical acclaim for using the
bass pedalboard
A pedalboard (also called a pedal keyboard, pedal clavier, or, with electronic instruments, a bass pedalboard) is a keyboard played with the feet that is usually used to produce the low-pitched bass line of a piece of music. A pedalboard has lon ...
on a
Hammond organ
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated ...
and for integrating synthesizer sounds onto the instrument, and was described by critic
Ron Wynn as "the most interesting jazz organist to emerge during the 1980s".
Career
Early years
Dennerlein was born and grew up in
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
, Germany.
She began playing the organ aged 11
after receiving a small
Hohner
Hohner Musikinstrumente GmbH & Co. KG is a German manufacturer of musical instruments, founded in 1857 by Matthias Hohner (1833–1902). The roots of the Hohner firm are in Trossingen, Baden-Württemberg. Since its foundation, and though known ...
instrument for Christmas. She was encouraged by her grandfather to learn a musical instrument, and her parents were both jazz enthusiasts. She took formal lessons for two years under the instruction of Paul Greisl, who had a
Hammond B-3
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated ...
. She immediately became interested in the instrument and that it contained a bass pedalboard, unlike her Hohner. After some searching, since the instrument was then out of production, she acquired her own Hammond aged 13 from her parents. She began to play concerts aged 14, and the following year, she played in a jazz club for the first time.
When leading her own bands, Dennerlein was often the youngest musician in the group, and she learned to cooperate with more experienced musicians. Her local reputation as the "Organ tornado from Munich" spread after her first
TV appearances in 1982.
Recordings
When her third
LP ''Bebab'' was issued, Dennerlein established her own record label in 1985
and assumed her own management duties, because she felt not enough support from either her existing label or from Hammond, who wanted to promote later digital models rather than the B-3 she used. She received two German Record Critics' awards for self-produced albums.
Later, she made three recordings for
Enja Records and three for
Verve Records
Verve Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group (UMG). Founded in 1956 by Norman Granz, the label is home to the world's largest jazz catalogue, which includes recordings by artists such as Ella Fitzgerald, Nina Simon ...
. On these recordings she worked with
Ray Anderson,
Randy Brecker
Randal Edward Brecker (born November 27, 1945) is an American trumpeter, flugelhornist, and composer. His versatility has made him a popular studio musician who has recorded with acts in jazz, rock, and R&B.
Early life
Brecker was born on No ...
,
Dennis Chambers
Dennis Milton Chambers (born May 9, 1959) is an American drummer. He was inducted into the '' Modern Drummer'' Hall of Fame in 2001.
Early life
Chambers was born on May 9, 1959. He began drumming at the age of four years, and was gigging in Ba ...
,
Roy Hargrove
Roy Anthony Hargrove (October 16, 1969 – November 2, 2018) was an American jazz musician and composer whose principal instruments were the trumpet and flugelhorn. He achieved worldwide acclaim after winning two Grammy Awards for differing style ...
,
Mitch Watkins, and
Jeff "Tain" Watts
Jeff "Tain" Watts (born January 20, 1960) is a jazz drummer who has performed with Wynton Marsalis, Branford Marsalis, Betty Carter, Michael Brecker, Alice Coltrane, Ravi Coltrane, and others.
Biography
Watts got the nickname "Tain" from Kenny ...
.
Instruments
Dennerlein modified a Hammond's pedalboard to trigger
samples of an acoustic bass and, impressed with results, decided to modify the manuals to play
samplers too. Her performances include solo performances, as well as quintets (e.g. her "Bebab" band). In both, she uses
MIDI
MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and ...
technology
and triggers built into pedals and manuals to trigger
synthesizers
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis a ...
and samples to her sound.
After a variety of projects and after playing with unconventional musicians, such as
Friedrich Gulda,
Dennerlein started playing the
pipe organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks' ...
in 1994. Since 2003, she has also developed jazz projects with
symphonic orchestras, including a collaboration with the
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
The Berlin Philharmonic (german: Berliner Philharmoniker, links=no, italic=no) is a German orchestra based in Berlin. It is one of the most popular, acclaimed and well-respected orchestras in the world.
History
The Berlin Philharmonic was f ...
on the
Karl Schuke organ.
Compositions
Dennerlein claims to have been primarily influenced by jazz and was not initially interested in classical or church music, although it was and is popular in Germany. She has never been enthusiastic about formal music theory, preferring to learn things through improvisation. However, she has further said that her main influence from jazz is the ability to mix other musical styles as desired, saying "To me, jazz is a synonym for freedom. Freedom from prejudice and discrimination".
Dennerlein's first album included four of her own pieces. Her
compositions
Composition or Compositions may refer to:
Arts and literature
*Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography
*Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include v ...
vary from traditional
blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the ...
schemes, romantic, melancholic
ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads derive from the medieval French ''chanson balladée'' or '' ballade'', which were originally "dance songs". Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and ...
s to tempo-driven compositions with elements of
swing
Swing or swinging may refer to:
Apparatus
* Swing (seat), a hanging seat that swings back and forth
* Pendulum, an object that swings
* Russian swing, a swing-like circus apparatus
* Sex swing, a type of harness for sexual intercourse
* Swing ri ...
,
bebop
Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrumen ...
,
funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the mi ...
and Latin rhythms.
The fast tempos and rhythmic figures she uses in her interpretations of well-known standards, and in many of her own compositions, require fast bass pedalboard foot work, though she has used bass players for recordings in order to feature techniques such as
slap bass
Slapping and popping are ways to produce percussive sounds on a stringed instrument. It is primarily used on the double bass or bass guitar. Slapping on bass guitar involves using the edge of one's knuckle, where it is particularly bony, to ...
, which cannot be played on pedals. Dennerlein often uses changing meter (e.g., 3/4 to 4/4), as well as unconventional harmonic changes to add expression to her compositions.
Awards
* ''1995'': "German Record Critics Award" ("Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik") for "Take Off"
* ''1995'': "Jazz Award" for "Take Off" for holding the number one position in the German Jazz Charts for several months and for being best selling Jazz Album of the year in Germany
* ''1987'': "German Record Critics Award" ("Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik") for "Tribute to Charlie".
Discography
*1983: ''Jazz Live''
*1984: ''Orgelspiele''
*1985: ''Bebab''
*1986: ''Days of Wine and Roses''
*1987: ''Tribute to Charlie''
*1988: ''Barbara Dennerlein Plays Classics''
*1989: ''Straight Ahead!''
*1989: ''Live on Tour!''
*1990: ''Hot Stuff'' and ''Barbara Dennerlein Duo'' (Bootleg)
*1991: ''(Friedrich Gulda) Mozart No End''
*1992: ''That's Me'' and ''Solo''
*1995: ''Take Off!''
*1997: ''Junkanoo''
*1999: ''Outhipped''
*2001: ''Love Letters''
*2002: ''Spiritual Movement No.1'' (church organ recording)
*2004: ''In a Silent Mood''
*2005: ''It's Magic''
*2006: ''The Best of Barbara Dennerlein''
*2007: ''Change of Pace'' (with
Philharmonic Orchestra under
Bernd Ruf)
*2008: ''Spiritual Movement No. 2'' (live at
Kaiser William Memorial Church in Berlin)
*2010: ''Bebabaloo''
*2012: ''Spiritual Movement No. 3'' (live 2008 concert on the
Rieger organ at the Stadtpfarrkirche in
Fehring
Fehring is a municipality in the district of Südoststeiermark in Styria, Austria. The landscape is rolling hills cut by the valley of the Raab. Fehring is on a socket some metres above the valley floor. The town is bordered to the east by Bu ...
, Austria, with guitarist Edi Köhldorfer)
*2015: ''Studiokonzert'' (live concert in recording studio, direct to two-track analogue tape)
*2015: ''Christmas Soul''
References
Cited sources
*
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dennerlein, Barbara
1964 births
Living people
German jazz organists
Hard bop organists
Post-bop organists
Women jazz musicians
Women organists
21st-century organists
21st-century women musicians