Roman Bunka (2 December 1951 – 12 June 2022) was a German guitarist, oud player and composer, active in

world music "World music" is an English phrase for styles of music from non-English speaking countries, including quasi-traditional, Cross-cultural communication, intercultural, and traditional music. World music's broad nature and elasticity as a musical ...

and

jazz fusion Jazz fusion (also known as jazz rock, jazz-rock fusion, or simply fusion) is a popular music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric gui ...

bands. He lived most of his life in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

, Bavaria, where he was involved in various musical crossover projects.

Career

Bunka was born in

Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...

on 2 December 1951. He started playing the guitar as a teenager. In the 1970s, he moved to Munich and joined the world music group

Embryo An embryo ( ) is the initial stage of development for a multicellular organism. In organisms that reproduce sexually, embryonic development is the part of the life cycle that begins just after fertilization of the female egg cell by the male sp ...

. They toured in Morocco, India and Afghanistan, and the music of these countries made a strong impact on Bunka and his fellow musicians. In 1979, Embryo traveled overland to India with three buses and their instruments. The tour was documented in the movie ''Vagabunden Karawane''. Besides the guitar, his second instrument was the Arabic oud, which he studied mainly in

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

. Having spent long periods of time there, he often played in the band of Egyptian singer and movie actor

Mohamed Mounir Mohamed Mounir (; born October 10, 1954) is an Egyptian singer and actor, with a musical career spanning more than four decades. He incorporates various genres into his music, including classical Egyptian music, Nubian music, Blues, Jazz and ...

, for example at the New Year's Eve concert in 2000 at the

Pyramids of Giza The Giza pyramid complex (also called the Giza necropolis) in Egypt is home to the Great Pyramid, the pyramid of Khafre, and the pyramid of Menkaure, along with their associated pyramid complexes and the Great Sphinx. All were built during th ...

. In 1994, Bunka presented his

ethno jazz Ethno jazz, also known as world jazz, is a subgenre of jazz and world music, developed internationally in the 1950s and '60s and broadly characterized by a combination of traditional jazz and non-Western musical elements. Though occasionally equa ...

project ''Color me Cairo'', featuring Malachi Favors of

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 (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, AACM) in the late 1960s. The ensemble integrates many jaz ...

, and Egyptian musicians Fathy Salama, Hosam Shakir and Khaled Goma at the

Berlin Jazz Festival JazzFest Berlin (also known as the Berlin Jazz Festival) is a jazz festival in Berlin, Germany. Originally called the "Berliner Jazztage" (''Berlin Jazz Days''), it was founded in 1964 in West Berlin by the Berliner Festspiele. Venues included B ...

, curated by

George Gruntz George Gruntz (24 June 1932 – 10 January 2013) was a Swiss jazz pianist, organist, harpsichordist, keyboardist, and composer known for the George Gruntz Concert Big Band and his work with Phil Woods, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Don Cherry, Chet Baker ...

. The same line-up was recorded by

Enja Records Enja Records is a German jazz record company and label based in Munich which was founded by jazz enthusiasts Matthias Winckelmann and Horst Weber in 1971. The label's first release was by Mal Waldron, and early releases included European and Jap ...

, with ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' magazine writing: "Bunka gets fame in a growing musical diaspora as 'best oud-player north of Mekka'." Bunka was known for his artistic collaboration with German and international musicians, such as the German world music groups Embryo, Dissidenten and Jisr, but also with jazz musicians

Mal Waldron Malcolm Earl "Mal" Waldron (August 16, 1925 – December 2, 2002) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger. He started playing professionally in New York in 1950, after graduating from college. In the following dozen years or so Wa ...

Charlie Mariano Carmine Ugo Mariano (November 12, 1923 – June 16, 2009) was an American jazz saxophone, saxophonist who focused on the alto saxophone, alto and soprano saxophone. He occasionally performed and recorded on flute and nadaswaram as well. Biogra ...

and

Malachi Favors Malachi Favors (August 22, 1927 – January 30, 2004) was an American jazz bassist who played with the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Biography "Favors's tendency to dissemble about his age was a well-known source of mirth to fellow musicians of his g ...

, as well as with Indian and Egyptian performers Trilok Gurtu,

Ramesh Shotham Ramesh Shotham (born May 7, 1948 in Madras, Tamil Nadu, India) is a percussionist and drummer. Life Ramesh Shotham was born in Madras, South India. He graduated with a degree in zoology from Loyola College, University of Madras. He began his musi ...

, Fathy Salama and others. German music critic Ralf Dombrowski wrote about Bunka's 2004 record ''Orientación'' with fellow musicians Luis Borda and Jost Heckler: "He is one of the first European musicians who dared to seriously explore the oud and liberated it from exoticism and

Orientalism In art history, literature, and cultural studies, Orientalism is the imitation or depiction of aspects of the Eastern world (or "Orient") by writers, designers, and artists from the Western world. Orientalist painting, particularly of the Middle ...

." During his 50-year career, Bunka recorded and played concerts with numerous musical groups, and also composed soundtracks for movies. A few weeks before his death, he played with the Munich-based group Jisr (Arabic for 'bridge') at concerts in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, India and Bangladesh. Bunka died of

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving Cell growth#Disorders, abnormal cell growth with the potential to Invasion (cancer), invade or Metastasis, spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Po ...

on 12 June 2022, in Munich at the age of 70, with both Egyptian and German newspapers publishing

obituaries An obituary (obit for short) is an article about a recently deceased person. Newspapers often publish obituaries as news articles. Although obituaries tend to focus on positive aspects of the subject's life, this is not always the case. Acco ...

Awards

* 1993 BBC Prix Futura for his production of the radio play ''Tunguska Guska'' by Grace Yoon, Sainkho Namtchylak, Iris Disse * 1995 German Critics Poll Winner for ''Color me Cairo'' with

and Egyptian musicians * 2014

Schwabing Art Prize Since 1961, the Schwabing Art Prize has been awarded annually by the city of Munich to persons or institutions that have their seat in the Munich district Schwabing or whose achievements have been made "in the spirit of Schwabing tradition". It is ...

Discography

* 1973 ''Steig Aus'' (also released as: ''This Is Embryo'') * 1973 ''We Keep On'' with Embryo * 1975 ''Surfin'' with Embryo * 1976 ''Bad Heads and Bad Cats'' with Embryo and Charlie Mariano * 1977 ''Apo-Calypso'' with Embryo * 1979 ''Aera Live'' with Locko Richter, Klaus Kreuzeder, Lutz Oldemeier, Helmut Meier-Limberg, Freddy Setz * 1980 ''Reise'' (CD) with Embryo ( Schneeball) * 1980 ''Dein Kopf ist ein schlafendes Auto'' * 1990 ''Germanistan'' with Dissidenten * 1993 ''The Jungle Book'' with Dissidenten (Exil) * 1995 ''Color Me Cairo'' with Malachi Favors and Fathy Salama (Enja) * 1997 ''Enshaallah'' with Rahala (united One Rec.) * 2008 ''Freedom in Music'' with Embryo * 2010 ''Embryo 40'' (Trikont)

Filmography (as composer and recording artist)

* 1995 ''Halfmoon'', by Frieder Schlaich, based on short stories by

Paul Bowles Paul Frederic Bowles (; December 30, 1910November 18, 1999) was an American expatriate composer, author, and translator. He became associated with the Moroccan city of Tangier, where he settled in 1947 and lived for 52 years to the end of his ...

* 1998 '' Am I Beautiful?'' (''Bin ich schön?'') by

Doris Dörrie Doris Dörrie (; born 26 May 1955) is a German film director, producer and author. Early life and education Born in Hanover, Dörrie completed her secondary education there in 1973. The same year, she began a two-year attendance in film studies ...

References

External links

*
Roman Bunka at Enja Records
* *
Roman Bunka plays a taqsim (solo improvisation) on the oud
on YouTube
''Vagabunden Karawane: A musical trip through Iran, Afghanistan and India'', 1979 with Embryo
on YouTube

nbsp;— CD Review with

Uli Trepte Uli Trepte (born 27 September 1941, Konstanz, Germany — died 21 May 2009, Berlin) was a German musician best known for his collaborations with various influential Krautrock bands in the early 1970s. Early career Uli Trepte began his musica ...