Manfred Eicher (born 9 July 1943) is a German record producer and the founder of

ECM Records ECM (Edition of Contemporary Music) is an independent record label founded by Karl Egger, Manfred Eicher and Manfred Scheffner in Munich in 1969. While ECM is best known for jazz music, the label has released a variety of recordings, and ECM's ...

Life and career

Eicher was born in Lindau, Germany. He studied music at the Academy of Music in Berlin. He started as a

double-bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox additions such as the octobass). Similar ...

player of classical music and later became a

record producer A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure. Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...

. In 1969, he founded

(Edition of Contemporary Music) in Munich. Some of the jazz artists he has recorded over more than 50 years of his career include Paul Bley, Keith Jarrett, John Abercrombie, Jan Garbarek,

Egberto Gismonti Egberto Amin Gismonti (born December 5, 1947) is a Brazilian composer, guitarist and pianist. Biography Gismonti was born in the small city of Carmo, state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, into a musical family. His mother was from Sicily and his ...

Chick Corea Armando Anthony "Chick" Corea (June 12, 1941 – February 9, 2021) was an American jazz composer, pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, and occasional percussionist. His compositions "Spain", "500 Miles High", "La Fiesta", "Armando's Rhumba", and " ...

Gary Burton Gary Burton (born January 23, 1943) is an American jazz vibraphonist, composer, and educator. Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the prevailing two-mallet technique. This approach caused him to be h ...

Jack DeJohnette Jack DeJohnette (born August 9, 1942) is an American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer. Known for his extensive work as leader and sideman for musicians including Charles Lloyd, Freddie Hubbard, Keith Jarrett, Bill Evans, John Abercrombie ...

Anouar Brahem Anouar Brahem ( أنور براهم); born on 20 October 1957) is a Tunisian oud player and composer. He is widely acclaimed as an innovator in his field. Performing primarily for a jazz audience, he combines Arabic classical music, folk music and ...

Dave Holland David “Dave” Holland (born 1 October 1946) is an English jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader who has been performing and recording for five decades. He has lived in the United States for over 40 years. His extensive discography r ...

Pat Metheny Patrick Bruce Metheny ( ; born August 12, 1954) is an American jazz guitarist and composer. He is the leader of the Pat Metheny Group and is also involved in duets, solo works, and other side projects. His style incorporates elements of progr ...

, Ralph Towner, Terje Rypdal, Steve Kuhn, Eberhard Weber, Jon Hassell, and the

Art Ensemble of Chicago The Art Ensemble of Chicago is an avant-garde jazz group that grew out of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians ( AACM) in the late 1960s. The ensemble integrates many jazz styles and plays many instruments, including "little ...

. '' The Köln Concert'', a solo piano performance by Keith Jarrett, recorded and released by ECM in 1975, became the all-time best-selling jazz solo piano album. In 1984, Eicher started a sublabel, ECM New Series, for classical music. Some of the artists, whose work was released on the New Series, were

Steve Reich Stephen Michael Reich ( ; born October 3, 1936) is an American composer known for his contribution to the development of minimal music in the mid to late 1960s. Reich's work is marked by its use of repetitive figures, slow harmonic rhythm, ...

Arvo Pärt Arvo Pärt (; born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of contemporary classical music. Since the late 1970s, Pärt has worked in a minimalist style that employs tintinnabuli, a compositional technique he invented. Pärt's music is in par ...

John Adams John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, attorney, diplomat, writer, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Befor ...

Gavin Bryars Richard Gavin Bryars (; born 16 January 1943) is an English composer and double bassist. He has worked in jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, avant-garde, and experimental music. Early life and career Born on 16 January 1943 in ...

, Meredith Monk, and the mediaeval composer Pérotin. The best selling album '' Officium'' (1994) was a collaboration between Jan Garbarek and the Hilliard Ensemble, performing compositions by Cristóbal de Morales, Pérotin and others. In 1992, Eicher co-directed and co-wrote the film ''Holozän'' (''Man in the Holocene''). In 2002 he wrote the score for the Israeli film ''Kedma''. Eicher has produced most of the records released on his label. Each jazz record takes an average of two days to record and one day to mix. Most were recorded with

Jan Erik Kongshaug Jan Erik Kongshaug (4 July 1944 – 5 November 2019) was a Norwegian sound engineer, jazz guitarist, and composer. Career Kongshaug was born in Trondheim, the son of guitarist John Kongshaug. Store Norske Leksikon (in Norwegian) During his ch ...

(of Talent Studios and later Rainbow Studios in Oslo, Norway) as

sound engineer An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a recording or a live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization, dynamics processing and audio effects, mixing, reproduction, ...

. Eicher has produced more than a thousand albums to date.

"Eicher's deceptively simple aesthetic is unfailingly harmonious. He records musicians he likes, allows them to trust their own instincts, and plays a directorial role." ('' Jazz Review'')

Awards

* 1976 ''

DownBeat ' (styled in all caps) is an American music magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond", the last word indicating its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chi ...

'': Producer of the Year * 1986 German Record Critics Award * 1998 Music Prize of the City of Munich * 1999 Commander of the Royal Order of the Polar Star from the King of Sweden * 1999 V Class Order of the Cross of St. Mary's Land from the President of

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and t ...

* 2000 Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters by the University of Brighton * 2001 Commander of the Royal Order of Merit from the King of

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

* 2002 Grammy Award for Producer of the Year, Classical, nominated in the same category in 2003, 2004, and 2018 * 2007 Bundesverdienstkreuz (Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany) * 2008 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2009 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2010 ''DownBeat'': Lifetime Achievement Award and Producer of the Year * 2012 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2013 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2014 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2015 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2016 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2017 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year * 2018 ''DownBeat'': Producer of the Year

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Eicher, Manfred 1943 births Living people German record producers German media executives Grammy Award winners Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana, 5th Class Jazz record producers Classical music producers