Julia Hülsmann

Jazz pianist, composer, and vocalist Julia Hülsmann creates an intelligent brand of poetic, airy, artful, jazz that balances the Nordic tradition, with folk, pop, and contemporary classical. Her primary trio with bassist Marc Muellbauer and drummer Rainer Winch (eventually replaced by <a href="spotify:artist:1SSqI0bXEMPNpjPb5iQQx6">Heinrich Köbberling</a>) issued Trio in 2003 and later that year, Scattering Poems, with vocalist <a href="spotify:artist:3oY7VC1i7SwfO1EhOIlc0t">Rebekka Bakken</a>. Hülsmann signed with <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22ECM%22">ECM</a> in 2008; the label released The End of a Summer. She also co-led the Fasil quintet with including Full View and 2014's globally acclaimed A Clear Midnight: Kurt Weill and America. She returned to the trio format on 2016's Sooner and Later. In 2019 she engaged the quartet for Not Far from Here, 2022's The Next Door, and 2025's Under the Surface.

Born in Bonn, Germany in 1968, Hülsmann took classical piano lessons from the age of 11 and started her first band at 16. In 1991, she moved to Berlin to study jazz piano and piano pedagogy at the University of the Arts (HdK). Her teachers include <a href="spotify:artist:4bWZyCEles7MnQ3pMLoMbQ">Walter Norris</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:09yacWNQY2fYjP3ubsmWTM">Aki Takase</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:4lgtxmgr3T7wS56YRuDmrY">David Friedman</a>. In particular, she was inspired and influenced by U.S. pianist and composer <a href="spotify:artist:0Ssqhquy8WFuqz7ZnZuBkR">Don Grolnick</a>. In 1992, Hülsmann joined the Federal Youth Jazz Orchestra, then directed by <a href="spotify:artist:53wjdpZmrOiteCmja3AM6K">Peter Herbolzheimer</a>. After graduating in 1996, she founded the <a href="spotify:artist:5v4UR5BS8T0DNSPCPYqfcG">Julia Hülsmann Trio</a> with bassist Marc Muellbauer and drummer Rainer Winch. The trio played music at various festivals and smaller tours. In early 2000, Hülsmann went to New York, where she studied and took lessons with <a href="spotify:artist:3AYoHrPhmpKwXL4beH0wCn">Richie Beirach</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:61bWkkCyCh1jSBmAKdC7sg">Maria Schneider</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:59bgiWWmCiIfBkzZ8URC1Q">Gil Goldstein</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:7yTM7wAWwfJvt0UsLoZXrq">Jane Ira Bloom</a>.

At a <a href="spotify:artist:7a7Vs88vzOcmHh4GOpUEJJ">Wolfgang Muthspiel</a> concert, she got to know the Norwegian singer <a href="spotify:artist:3oY7VC1i7SwfO1EhOIlc0t">Rebekka Bakken</a>. Hülsmann began composing for her and released her debut, Trio, at the end of year. After composing, finding suitable lyrics for a vocal project began. She eventually discovered the poet <a href="spotify:artist:7jZ1ZWDGgv2Q1RNIS7U8CQ">e.e. cummings</a>. The pianist persuaded <a href="spotify:artist:3oY7VC1i7SwfO1EhOIlc0t">Bakken</a> to be part of her project, and in 2003 the album Scattering Poems appeared from <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22ACT%22">ACT</a>. It spent several weeks in the Top Ten on the German jazz charts.

Although she is an accomplished songwriter, Hülsmann's work has often tended toward interpretation, and she has done intriguing reconfigurations of the songs of <a href="spotify:artist:3HQyFCFFfJO3KKBlUfZsyW">Randy Newman</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:5c3GLXai8YOMid29ZEuR9y">Nick Drake</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:0Ty63ceoRnnJKVEYP0VQpk">Sting</a>, and has provided striking jazz soundscapes for the poems of <a href="spotify:artist:7jZ1ZWDGgv2Q1RNIS7U8CQ">e.e. cummings</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:72q8JOv3BsuoTkifnwwUtI">Emily Dickinson</a>. Come Closer, with vocalist <a href="spotify:artist:0LmFWmRPzDK376bTFlnVr5">Anna Lauvergnac</a>, was released in 2004 by <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22ACT%22">ACT</a>, followed by Good Morning Midnight, featuring singer <a href="spotify:artist:2pR1RkvFKvb2KWSjrbCIP2">Roger Cicero</a>, in 2006. Hülsmann reverted to a straight trio for her first two <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22ECM%22">ECM</a> recordings, The End of a Summer, which appeared in 2008, and Imprint, which followed in 2011. In 2013, Hülsmann released her first quartet album, In Full View, featuring British trumpeter <a href="spotify:artist:3WivHJ2HdZ8SCDqN5owYJV">Tom Arthurs</a>.

She did the international festival circuit while conceiving a new project based on the songs of <a href="spotify:artist:69a1b61a56mJlx8iAUMBsY">Kurt Weill</a>. Her trio -- with Marc Muellbauer on bass and <a href="spotify:artist:1SSqI0bXEMPNpjPb5iQQx6">Heinrich Köbberling</a> on drums -- was again appended by <a href="spotify:artist:3WivHJ2HdZ8SCDqN5owYJV">Arthurs</a> and the voice of <a href="spotify:artist:0BaPQJfbkwN3y4n7qALgRZ">Theo Bleckman</a>. She radically reconfigured nine <a href="spotify:artist:69a1b61a56mJlx8iAUMBsY">Weill</a> tunes and three settings of poems by Walt Whitman, and created what amounted to a concerto for the two additional members. The resulting album, Clear Midnight/Kurt Weill & America, was released by <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22ECM%22">ECM</a> in 2015, earning rave reviews and an international tour.

Hülsmann, Muellbauer, and <a href="spotify:artist:1SSqI0bXEMPNpjPb5iQQx6">Köbberling</a> toured the world playing on stages across Europe and North America, as well as Peru, Central Asia, and China. The experience of that tour was made clear to listeners on 2017's trio outing Sooner and Later. The influence of the journey can be heard on "Biz Joluktuk," a tune the band heard performed by a 12-year-old violinist in Kyrgyzstan; it was later re-harmonized by Hülsmann. The long-lived trio once again expanded to a quartet, adding Berlin-based saxophonist Uli Kempendorff for Not Far from Here. Issued in November of 2019, it included five Hülsmann compositions and a cover of "This Is Not America," co-composed by <a href="spotify:artist:0oSGxfWSnnOXhD2fKuz2Gy">David Bowie</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:3t58jfUhoMLYVO14XaUFLA">Pat Metheny</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:3yjmQDYGp9XYnFwptDvYc4">Lyle Mays</a>. It appeared in both a quartet version and a solo piano variation.

Hülsmann composed half of 2022's 12-track The Next Door. The balance included compositions from her bandmates, and a tender, spacious rendition of <a href="spotify:artist:5a2EaR3hamoenG9rDuVn8j">Prince</a>'s "Sometimes It Snows in April." The bandleader reconvened the quartet for 2025's Under the Surface, but expanded the lineup with veteran Norwegian trumpeter <a href="spotify:artist:4UQCOsb6CvwVBk1yRUs8Xt">Hildegunn Øiseth</a> on five cuts (she also plays goat horn). Hülsmann wrote half the album, with the remainder being composed by her quartet bandmates. ~ Thom Jurek, Rovi