„Music has the power to express anything that can't be said in words. It can reflect the full existence, the heart, soul and mind of any human being. The more honest it should be“.(Ulrich Drechsler)
Ulrich Drechsler started playing the clarinet in the marching band of his hometown at the age of nine. In order to getting prepared for entering a classical conservatory he studied with a clarinet teacher of the operahouse in Stuttgart. At the age of sixteen he taught himself to the tenor saxophone, leading him to focus more on improvised music. Finally he decided to study jazz and moved to Austria. Between 1992 and 1998 he studied in Graz at the University of Arts.
Since 1999 Ulrich Drechsler is living in Vienna as a freelance composer and musician. He chose the bass clarinet as main instrument. The broad experiences made in his student years mirrors in his versatile projects.
Short after arriving in Vienna he founded the trio Café Drechsler with drummer Alex Deutsch and bassist Oliver Steger which caused international furore. Stilistic elements of various styles of music, like contemporary electronic music, melt into a completely improvised and acoustic context. For their third album the group received the austrian Amadeus Award in 2005.
In the quartet Poesis Ulrich Drechsler dedicated himself to classical music. 2001 the group released a completely new adaption of Franz Schubert's song cycle "Die Winterreise" for jazz quartet entiteled "Nebensonnen".
Ulrich Drechsler has a strong bond with the music of Thelonious Monk. He put together the group The Monk In All Of Us that committed itself fully to interpreting the musical oeuvre of this great genius of jazz history. With the exotic lineup bass-/contrabass clarinet, trumpet, double bass and drums the group travels on yet unknown paths through the compositions of the great pianist. Their debut album "the Monk in all of us" has been
nominated for the prestigious Hans Koller Award in 2005.
The Ulrich Drechsler Quartet, founded in 2005, was his debut as a band leader. With this fantastic group, featuring longterm compagnions Oliver Steger, Jörg Mikula and the extraordinairy norwegian piano player Tord Gustavsen, Ulrich Drechsler presented his original compositions for the very first time. In Tord Gustavsen he found a partner who absorbs his ideas perfectly, processing them in his own unmistakeable unique way. The debut album "Humans & Places" got raving reviews both from audience and critics.
After six years of intense concert touring "Café Drechsler" was substituted by a new project: "Drechsler" is the name of the new quartet that is staffed - next to Ulrich Drechsler - with Oliver Steger and Jörg Mikula accompanied by the great Zuzee on the turntables. Although the sound is familiar - music for dancing, a blend of HipHop, drum'n'bass, Jazz, R&B, Bossa Nova etc. - due to the new cast a totally new, independent, contemporary sound emerged. The first album "Fortune Cookie" has been released in 2006.
In order to give his compositions new forms of expression, in 2007, together with guitarist Heimo Trixner and percussionist Jörg Mikula, he founded the "Daily Mysteries Trio" with the debut of the album "Daily Mysteries" in the same year. Similarly to the music of the quartet with Tord Gustavsen, the melodies and their gentle motion play a dominant role. The distance to the "proper" rhythm-group, the unique interpretation of the bass clarinet, guitar und drums, as well as the absolute equilibrium of the instruments allow the musicians to move much more freely within the context. The music acquires an ascending atmospheric character.
In 2009 Ulrich presented a new line-up of his Nu Jazz band "DRECHSLER" together with a new album entiteled "The Big Easy". With keyboarder Benny Omerzell from Austria and swiss bass player Patrick Zambonin together with the well-known drummer Jörg Mikula and DJ Zuzee the band sounds totally refreshed and renewed. Especially the keyboards give the music some complete new facets.
The same year Ulrich finished the work on his first movie soundtrack. Together with musicians from his different band projects he created nearly the complete music for the austrian movie"Todespolka", directed by Michael Pfeifenberger.
After nearly two years of prearrangement he presents his new quartet project in 2010. The idea was to combine two of his favorite instruments, the bass clarinet and the cello, to found a new sound. The band features a completely unique line-up: Ulrich on bass clarinet, Jörg Mikula on drums and frame drum and the two cellists extraordinaire Rina Kaçinari and Christof Unterberger. The debut album of the new Ulrich Drechsler Cello Quartet entitled "Concinnity" has been released by the prestigious german record label Enja in autumn 2010.
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