John Eckhardt
Kontra- und E-Bass
Like a modern-day hunter-gatherer, John Eckhardt has been present in contemporary music for three decades, focusing on interdisciplinary projects dedicated to the themes of ecology, evolution, and diversity. As a contrabass and electric bass player, he has developed a diverse narrative of solo projects and works as an ensemble musician with Klangforum Wien and the ensembles Modern, Musikfabrik, and Resonanz. He has premiered hundreds of works and contributed to more than 40 albums on labels such as Touch, Mode, Kairos, Act, and his own label, Depth of Field Music.
John Eckhardt has performed in Europe, Asia, and North and South America and has collaborated with a wide range of artists, from Pierre Boulez, Helmut Lachenmann, Evan Parker, Eric Schaefer, Peter Evans, and Peter Brötzmann to a broad spectrum of artists of the younger generation. He has released a series of internationally acclaimed solo releases in special art editions and uses a wide variety of bass instruments to explore the acoustics and history of places, spaces, and landscapes in sound installations. Like his work under the pseudonyms Fatwires and Forresta, his Basswald DJ podcast is dedicated to the more experimental sides of sound system culture. Another of his passions is photography. In addition to regular masterclasses, John Eckhardt teaches improvisation at the Hamburg University of Music and Theater and is a mentor in the PhD program “Improvisational Languages in Contemporary Music” at the Accademia Nazionale del Jazz in Siena.
John Eckhardt has been active in ensemble aisthesis since 2015.