Jakob Bro

Danish jazz guitarist born in Copenhagen on April 11, 1978, Jakob Bro is distinguished by an intimate and atmospheric style, sometimes close to ambient music, which he has developed over a career rich in collaborations. Introduced to jazz by his father, he learned to play the guitar at the age of twelve and pursued musical studies that took him to the United States, to the Berklee College of Music in Boston and then to the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in New York. In 2004, he joined Paul Motion's Electric Bebop Band. Back in Denmark, he began by recording with Jakob Dinesen in the quartet Beautiful Day (2002) then produced a series of albums for Loveland Records, where he invited acquaintances established during his American stay, including Chris Cheek, Chris Speed, Mark Turner, Ben Street, Paul Motian, Bill Frisell, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Nasheet Waits and Lee Konitz. Over the course of these recordings, Pearl River (2007), One Kiss Too Many (2008), The Stars Are All New Songs Vol. 1 (2008), Balladeering (2009) or Time (2011), Jakob Bro developed his own minimalist style, where he used effects pedals to create loops and varied sounds. The year 2008 saw him form an electric nonet for the live album White Rainbow and a trio for Who Said Gay Paree?. After the experimental Bro/Nak of 2012, shared with Thomas Knak, and a collaboration with Jakob Buchanan, the guitarist joined the fold of Manfred Eicher's ECM label, which produced all his following sessions. In 2015, the album Gefion marked the beginning of this collaboration continued by Streams (2016), Returnings (2018) and Bay of Rainbows (live, 2018), in which Thomas Morgan, Jon Christensen, Joey Baron and Palle Mikkelborg participated. In 2021, he teamed up with Arve Henriksen and Jorge Rossy for Ulma Uno and the following year with saxophonist Joe Lovano for a tribute to Paul Motian entitled Once Around the Room. It was with the late saxophonist Lee Konitz that Taking Turns, released in 2024, had been recorded alongside Bill Frisell, Jason Moran, Thomas Morgan and Andrew Cyrille. The guitarist has received numerous awards in Denmark including two Carl Prize Jazz as composer of the year (2013, 2016) and six Danish Music Awards between 2003 and 2016.