Gerard Presencer

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Gerard Presencer (b. 12 September 1972) is an English jazz trumpeter who has also made a name as a session player in pop-music contexts, and as a jazz educator.

Presencer was born in Watford, Hertfordshire. Though he had no formal musical edication, his father, Alain Presencer, an anthropologist and psychologist, and the creator of the album Singing Bowls of Tibet, was a music fan with a broad range of interests; one of his records, featuring Roy Eldridge, led to his son's interest in the trumpet at the age of nine. At the age of eleven, Gerard Presencer became the youngest trumpeter with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra, and at fourteen he began playing professionally.

He worked with British musicians such as Tommy Smith, Stan Tracey, Peter King, John Dankworth, Julian Joseph, and Jason Rebello, as well as with international musicians, including Johnny Griffin, Phil Woods, Joe Sample, and Niels-Henning Ørsted Pederson. He is a member of Charlie Watts' Tentet, with which he has recorded four albums, and was a featured soloist on US3's album Cantaloop (Blue Note's biggest-selling release). He has also released two albums as leader.

Presencer has also been a popular session musician, recording with Sting, James Brown, Ray Charles, Tina Turner, Incognito, Kula Shaker, and the Pet Shop Boys.

As a jazz educationalist, he has taught at the Guildhall School of Music and the Royal Academy of Music (where is the Head of Jazz), as well as a professor at Berlin's Hochschule für Musik "Hans Eisler".

[edit] Discography as leader

  • 1998: Platypus (Linn)
  • 2000: The Optimist (Linn)
  • 2002: Chasing Reality (ACT)

[edit] Sources and external links

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