Johanna Klein Quartet
Biography Johanna Klein Quartet
Johanna Klein
is a Cologne-based jazz saxophonist and composer. After learning the piano as a child, she took up the saxophone and played in the local IKS Big Band, as well as with the State Youth Big Band of Hesse from 2010 to 2015. In 2010 she won the competition Jugend Jazzt. Johanna Klein studied from 2014 to 2020 at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln with Niels Klein, Roger Hanschel and Claudius Valk. She has toured many countries, such as USA, France, South Africa, Bulgaria, Switzerland and Lithuania with various projects. With her quartet she won the jazz@undesigned award 2019. In 2020 she received a scholarship from the Ministry of Culture and Science of North Rhine-Westphalia and in 2021 the scholarship for jazz and improvised music Musiker*innen beflügelt.
Johanna Klein Quartet
„No matter which wavelengths we use to listen to the interstellar radio traffic, no matter in which direction we point our radio telescopes: so far we hear nothing but noise. So instead we send out music ourselves, expressing how we perceive our world, as well as the feelings we carry within us.“
Johanna Klein (saxophone), Nicolai Amrehn (bass), Leo Engels (guitar) and Jan Philipp (drums) are all based in Cologne and have known each other for many years. Together as the Johanna Klein Quartet, they move between modern jazz and free improvisation, whilst also incorporating elements of pop and rock. Through the playful balancing of the compositions of the bandleader with a healthy amount of improvisational freedom, the band has developed it’s sound over many years; a sound that is specific and focused, yet occasionally unpredictable. Their debut album COSMOS successfully and succinctly documents this musical vision and will be released in 2021 on BERTHOLD records.
