Philipp Gropper

Philipp Gropper (tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone, composition) was born in Berlin in 1978. He began to play the saxophone at the age of seven.
Gropper studied the jazz saxophone at the UDK Berlin and played with the concert section of Bujazzo for two years. He has since been busy as a freelance sax player and composer, dedicating most of his time to developing his musical ideas.
In 2003, he started the trio HYPERACTIVE KID with Ronny Graupe and Christian Lillinger, and in 2012 founded the quartet PHILM, in the actual line up with Elias Stemeseder, Robert Landfermann and Leif Berger. In 2013 - exploring yet again a completely different field of music - he initiated TAU5, an electro acoustic group with Philipp Zoubek, Petter Eldh, Ludwig Wandinger and Moritz Baumgärtner. In 2020 he started another group together with Gaia Mattiuzzi and Grischa Lichtenberger.
Concerts with these bands and others have brought Gropper to over 40 countries across Europe, Africa, Asia, North and South America. He has had the honour of sharing a stage with wonderful musicians such as Ralph Towner, Jim Black, Bobby McFerrin, Kresten Osgood, Nasheet Waits, Evi Filippou, Olaf Rupp, Ceylan Ertem, Maria Joao, Paulo Cardoso, James Knapp, Kaja Drachsler, Kit Downes, Dan Nicholls, Günter Baby Sommer, Axel Dörner, Mat Maneri, Matthew Herbert, Changuito, DJ IllVibe, Bilderbuch, Marc Ducret, Nils Petter Molvaer, Ibadet Ramadani, SEEED, Peter Evans and many others.
As a sideman he plays with Wanja Slavin's Lotus Eaters, Pablo Held’s Glow, The Killing Popes, Home Stretch, European Movement Jazz Orchester and some more.
Gropper has recorded more than 60 albums and has been awarded several prizes.
In connection with his musical work Philipp Gropper is very much concerned with questions of society and cultural politics, he sees community and collective work as the answer to many problems and a road into the future. Together with friends and colleaugues he initiated e.g. the IG Jazz Berlin, the DJU, an association to save the house of music Forsterstraße, as well as a german wide organization fighting classism in music and the meta community „future bloom“. He is a member of Jazzkollektiv Berlin and the Future Bash collective.
No matter how his music sounds or where it goes, Philipp Gropper always understands himself as inspired by mainly black american music.

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