Multi-instrumentalist
Gebhard Ullmann (born on November 2, 1957) grew up near Bonn, studied medicine and music in Hamburg starting 1976, and moved to Berlin in 1983 to live as a professional musician. One year later, the 27-year-old was leading (and co-leading) his own bands, releasing his first albums in 1985. The next few years saw him working with
Alexander Von Schlippenbach and
Paul Bley (among many others) as well as touring the Middle East, East Africa, Australia, New Zealand, South East Asia, Turkey, Poland, Lithuania and Estonia. In 1990, he began his Ta Lam project, whose second recording brought together musicians from East and West Berlin's jazz and new music scenes; the album was nominated Best Jazz Record of 1994 by the German Schallplattenkritik. A compilation of the two Ta Lam releases (originally released on Germany's 99 Records) was released in 1998 by the Songlines label. Since the mid-90s,
Ullmann has split his time between Berlin and New York, played in Gunter Lenz' Springtime, and occasionally collaborated on projects with actor Otto Sander. The end of the '90s found
Ullmann playing in
the Clarinet Trio, Trad Corrosion (with
Phil Haynes and guitarist
Andreas Willers, (a longtime collaborator), in Basement Research (his group with
Ellery Eskelin (later replaced by
Tony Malaby),
Drew Gress, and
Haynes) and in
Conference Call, a cooperative quartet with
Michael Jefry Stevens,
Joe Fonda and
Matt Wilson or
Han Bennink on the drums. In 2001, he began working with the
NDR Big Band (with
Tom Rainey on drums), eventually releasing the Big Band Project in 2004 featuring arrangements of his compositions by
Satoko Fujii,
Andy Emler and others. While recording and touring with all these various projects,
Ullmann still found time to perform with the likes of
Hamid Drake,
Lee Konitz,
Herb Robertson, Bulgarian master
Ivo Papasov and
Tony Buck (the
Necks) among others while touring. 2004 saw still more touring with
Conference Call (now with
George Schuller on the drums), the
Clarinet Trio (augmented by
Hans Hassler on accordion), and a new quintet version of Basement Research as well as releases by
Conference Call, the aforementioned Big Band Project the third CD of the
Clarinet Trio and Desert Songs & Other Landscapes with the Ullmann/Swell 4 featuring
Barry Altschul on the drums. 2005 was a landmark year for
Gebhard Ullmann, celebrating 20 years since his first release and debuting a new project:
Bass X3 with
Peter Herbert and
Chris Dahlgren on basses and
Ullmann on bass flute and bass clarinet. ~ Joslyn Layne & Sean Westergaard