Daniel Erdmann

Daniel Erdmann was born in 1973 in Wolfsburg, Germany. He has been playing saxophone since 1983 and studied with Gebhard Ullmann in the jazz class of the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin, his adopted city.

He has recorded albums for various labels, including BMC, ENJA, ACT, LABEL BLEU, INTAKT and has played all over the world with bands and musicians such as Das Kapital, Erdmann 3000, Vincent Courtois, Aki Takase, Carlos Bica, Frank Möbus, DJ Illvibe, Heinz Sauer, John Betsch, Christophe Marguet, Claude Tchamitchian, Henri Texier. He regularly tours for the Goethe Institute in South-East Asia, Central America, etc.

From 2001 Daniel Erdmann moved to Berlin and Paris after receiving a grant from the Franco-German High Cultural Council, and in 2014 he moved to Reims and created the Franco-German company Das Atelier. He then founded his new band, Velvet Revolution, with Théo Ceccaldi and Jim Hart. The band's first album on BMC Records was awarded the annual German Critics' Prize and an Echo Jazz. Daniel Erdmann also collaborates with dancer Nicolas Fayol and painter Jean-Michel Hannecart. In the fall of 2019, the second album of Velvet Revolution was released.

Daniel Erdmann was elected European Musician of the Year 2019 by the Académie du Jazz in Paris, received the SWR Jazzpreis 2020 and the Deutscher Jazzpreis in 2021.

Photo credit: Dirk Bleicker

Audio excerpt: Isn’t it romantic? (BMC Records, 2021) en duo with Aki Takase (piano).