juergen groezinger

photo: Pharea Nutello

Berlin-based musician Jürgen Grözinger studied classical percussion in Munich and Stuttgart and cultural management in Hamburg. He plays in various formations between classical music, contemporary music and improvisation. These include Ensemble Mosaik and Ensemblekollektiv Berlin, Berlin Piano Percussion, Orchestra Internazionale d’Italia; Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss, Hanover and Stuttgart State Operas. He has performed at venues and festivals such as the Berliner Philharmonie, Berliner Festspiele, MaerzMusik, Ultima Oslo, Wien Modern and many others.

Grözinger’s own music and his programmes deal with the tension between intellectual reflection and physical-sensual experience. Whenever possible, he would like to invite his audience on dazzling journeys in which he explores and senses sound, rhythm and form in a wide variety of musical genres.

He works on various formats such as a music festival, on solo and ensemble projects, sound spaces and concert installations. He has developed corresponding projects for the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart and the Bauhaus Museum Dessau, for example, or as artist in residence at the Heidenheim Opera Festival in the „Zeitgenossen“ project. His ballet music „Infinite Beauty“ at the Trier Theatre (2023-24) was crowned with great success.

As a certified sound therapist, he specialises in meditative music experiences and sound journeys.

As a DJ (Jueri Gagarino), he creates sets that range from electronic dance music to world, jazz and soul to classical and avant-garde.

He is a radio dj for WDR’s KLASSIK-KLUB. He has performed for the YELLOW LOUNGE, Berlin (Deutsche Grammophon), the Rundfunkchorlounge Berlin,, the Dresdner Musikfestspiel and Festival Potsdam-Sanssouci.

He is artistic director of the KlangHaus festival in Ulm.

His ensemble European Music Project, moves between contemporary music and improvisation, performance and club settings.

He has written works for various vocal and instrumental ensembles, electronic music, as well as several large choral and orchestral works. He has composed for the city of Ulm, Ulm Minster, theatre and film music as well as for dance.

An interview  by Wait A Mo

Excerpt from a radio feature at the German radio / deutschlandfunk:

Goezinger relies on the immediacy of musical experience, on transfers that arise from the programmatic context. He spans arches between different genres, times, aesthetic ideas, philosophies. He is a specialist in extravagant mixtures. Grözinger wants to involve young audiences and overcome the rigidity and distance of the concert business. (Rainer Schlenz)

vita

Juergen Groezinger was born in Ulm, Germany. After winning two federal prizes in the „Jugend Musiziert“ competition, he started his music studies at the music accademy in Munich while graduating at high school.  This he continued at the Stuttgart music accademy. In Hamburg he completed postgraduate studies in cultural management.

This was followed by numerous activities in orchestras such as the „Orchestra Internazionale d’Italia“, the „Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss am Rhein“, the „Kammerakademie Potsdam“ and the „Deutsches Kammerorchester Berlin“. As a temp, he played in the state opera orchestras of Munich, Stuttgart and Hannover. In the field of contemporary music he has played with „Klangforum Wien“, the Berlin ensembles „Mosaik“, „United“, „Berlin Piano Percussion“ and many others. He has played with soloists such as Antonis Anissegos, Anna Clementi, Sergio Azzolini, Rohan de Saram, Hellmut Hattler, Michiko Hirajama, Nicholas Isherwood, Kenichi And The Sun, Joo Kraus, Paula Morelenbaum, Mike Svoboda, Marianne Schröder, Stefano Scodanibbio and many others.

Guest performances have taken him to many national and international festivals (Berliner Festspiele, MaerzMusik, Berlin; Steirischer Herbst, Graz; Wien Modern; Nuovi Spazi, Rome; Warschauer Herbst; Ultima, Oslo; Klangspuren, Schwaz; Ravenna Festival; Movement, Saarbrücken; Spaziomusica, Cagliari; New Music Meeting, Brno and many others).

Early on, he broke new ground in concert design and the presentation of music. Behind this was the desire to open and, if necessary, overcome the boundaries between the genres of art and music itself. He felt committed to his high standards of quality and the desire to make even unusual contemporary music an experience every time and thus to reach the most diverse people.
Similarly, he understands his work as a DJ, where he creates exciting connections from the repertoire of classical music, jazz and current styles of electronic club music.

As a „classical dj“ he played in world-famous Berlin clubs like „Berghain“, „Watergate“ or „Cookies“; he mixed for the „Yellow Lounge“ (Deutsche Grammophon / Universal Music) and for the classical lounge of the Rbb.

He also developed classical lounges for the Rundfunkchor Berlin, the Dresden Music Festival, the Komische Oper Berlin, the Mozartfest Augsburg, the Schlössernacht in Potsdam, the Festival Musica in Bayreuth, the ProMusica concerts in Hannover, the Württembergische Philharmonie Reutlingen and the Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss am Rhein. Since 2016 his sets have had a firm place in the „WDR3-Klassik-Klub“. A collaboration with the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra is planned for 2019.

The festival KLANGHAUS („neue musik im stadthaus ulm“), founded by him, is characterized by consistent ideational work and the highest international standard. It regularly (orchestrates) broad audiences to long-lasting encounters with contemporary music.
Composers such as Klaus Huber, David Lang, Michael Nyman, Samir Odeh Tamimi, Sandeep Bhagwati, Dieter Schnebel or Adriana Hölzsky wrote works for the festival or developed special events in close exchange with Groezinger. His festival concepts bear titles such as „The American Way“, „EROS“, „BEAUTYbroken“, „Stimmung“.

He often works together with artists from the visual arts or other genres. The result is concert formats that, far away from the classical podium concert, move towards forms of music theatre and concert installation.

Recently Groezinger has increasingly devoted himself to composition and at the same time to open forms of improvisation, increasingly also in the context of forms of meditation.

In July 2017 his work „Nacht und Morgen“, for 2 choirs, orchestra, percussion and organ, was premiered with great success at the Ulmer Muenster .
In September 2017 a compositional work for the Stadtheater Theater Pforzheim followed which was followed in November 2017 by a work for the ballet of the Ulmer Theater – ACQUA (choreography Roberto Scafati). The play and especially the music was frenetically acclaimed by the audience.

His Berlin projects „Alchemistic Cabaret“ (with Hillary Jeffery) „Salon der Verzueckung“ (with Thomas Raditschnik) and „Resonance Room“ (with „Neue Heimat“, Berlin) move between salon and meditative sound space.

Juergen Groezinger lives in Berlin.