Resumé

  • 2007 National German television interview/performance as multi-instrumentalist/composer on ARD Buffet
  • 2007 Publishing contract with Norsk Musikforlag, for the publicaton of collected works
  • 2007 CD ‘Jetzt Wohin?’ – New Songs to poems by Heinrich Heine, commissioned by the Culture Foundation of the Landkreis Mainz-Bingen, Germany
  • 2007 Premiere Concert, World Music ensemble ‘Asavari’ Bingen, Germany
  • 2006 Feature Interview, Perqsja, Percussion Journal, Poland
  • 2006 ‘Shinkansen’ – for piano, trombone & percussion, commissioned by Shiori & Hiroshi Tanaka, Tokyo, Japan
  • 2006 Crossdrumming Festival, Warsaw, with Julie Spencer
  • 2006 CD Productions: Colors of the Soul / Out of the Stillness (commissioned by the city of Bingen) / Griot
  • 2005 until today: Adjunct faculty Frankfurt University; Music teacher, Hildegardis School Bingen
  • 2004 CD Harp Travels
  • 2004 Concert tour to Japan, with Julie Spencer, organized by Japan Percussion Society
  • 2004 Premiere Performances ‘Phases of the Moon’ for Piano & Marimba, Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, Japan
  • 2003 return to Germany
  • 2002 ‘Soundings’ Concert production with premieres of new compositions by Gernot Blume, in collaboration with 120 musicians, Lewis & Clark College, Portland, Oregon
  • 2001 sabbatical, composing in Strasbourg, France
  • 1998-2003 Assistant Professor for ethnomusicology, Lewis & Clark College, Portland, Oregon, USA
  • 1994-1998 Ph.D. in ethnomusicology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA
  • 1994 Performance with Ensemble Common Ground at the International Convention of the Percussive Arts Society, Atlanta, USA (live-video production released by Bellwin/Warner Brothers)
  • 1994 Art prize of the city of Bingen, Germany
  • 1993 Founding of Spencer Blume Publishing for the publication of compositions by Julie Spencer & Gernot Blume
  • 1991 Performance with Ensemble Colored Fish at the International Convention of the Percussive Arts Society, Los Angeles, USA
  • 1990 Premieres of compositions for large Jazz Ensemble, International Association of Jazz Educators Convention, New Orleans, USA
  • 1988-1992 studies in world music, jazz, composition, at the California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California, USA

Born in Bingen on the Rhine, Germany, composer, pianist, and multi-instrumentalist Gernot Blume grew up with classical piano music as well as Irish, Yiddish, and Eastern European folk music.  He learned guitar, mandolin, percussion, flutes, and harp. 1988 he moved to Los Angeles, California, in order to study world music at CalArts. There he also studied Indian classical music with Amiya Dasgupta, a main disciple of the famous sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar. He also studied ethnomusicology at the University of Michigan, where he earned a doctorate with a dissertation on the American jazz pianist Keith Jarrett. For five years he taught as Assistant Professor of Music at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon, USA. In 2003 he returned to his native Germany, where he works as an independent musician, composer, and lecturer.

As a composer and musician Gernot Blume received numerous prizes and stipends in the USA and Germany. He is the recipient of the art prize of his native city, Bingen on the Rhine. Since 1981 he makes music for concerts, cds, films, and videos, and his compositions have been performed at numerous renowned cultural institutions in the US, Japan, Poland, and Germany.

Under his name, and in collaboration with his wife, the American musician and composer Julie Spencer, he has released nine CDs:

“Ask” (1992), “Changes Inside” (1995), “Lost and Found” (2000), “Harp Travels” (2004), “Ecstatic Sunlight” (2005), “Colors of the Soul” (2006), “Griot” (2006) and “Out of the Stillness” (2006), “Jetzt Wohin?” (2007), as well as a Live-Concert-Video, “Common Ground” (1994).