Anja Gallenkamp
jazz historian
Berlin Historian
I grew up in Munich. The 11th school year I spent in Valencia, Spain. In 2000 I moved to Berlin, where I live since then. In the meantime three stays in Kerala, India, took place. And for half a year I was working in Amsterdam, Holland, among other things for the Holland Festival.
In Berlin I studied philosophy and modern / recent history in the context of the master at the Humboldt University. My master’s thesis was about the social history of jazz in Frankfurt / Main after the Second World War. In this way, I became aware of how well music is suited to capture the mood of a generation and a bygone atmosphere!
I´ve had always jazz music in my life and worked in the Munich jazz club Unterfahrt in 2000 and then until 2002 in the Berlin jazz club Quasimodo. I wanted to keep this more practical approach. So in addition to the publication of two historical articles in an anthology and in a journal and that of a book on jazz in postwar Frankfurt/Main I graduated I completed internships in 2010 at the Munich jazz label enja records and in 2011 at the Frankfurt studio Hazelwood records. In 2012 and 13 I took over the booking and organization of jazz concerts in the Berlin club Fincan – Jazz and Film Art..
Previously, in 2011, I had a research internship in the research group “Felt Communities? Emotions in European Musical Life ” at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin bringing me into contact with sociology and theoretically substantiated my idea of telling jazz stories on the basis of social historical facts. Out came the jazz historian and the setting naturally shifted to Berlin.
A jazz historian writing or narrating
Here I set up my own business “Jazzgeschichten“, became member of the Berlin International tour guide association BBS, and in 2022 I started to provide tours as jazz historian in the context of the Jazzguide Berlin, too.
Telling the stories on jazz tours, in jazz talks, or in a show, mixed up with some music I particularly enjoy because of the life-moments – stories of people, zeitgeist, lifestyle and the sounds of bygone times!
to read:
Jazz in der Nachkriegszeit, München: Akademische Verlagsgemeinschaft München (2009)
Eine deutsche Jazzgeschichte 1945 – 1949 in: Sarah Zalfen, Sven Oliver Müller (Hg.) Besatzungsmacht Musik, Zur Musik- und Emotionsgeschichte im Zeitalter der Weltkriege, Bielefeld: transcript-Verlag, S. 299 – 326 http://www.mpib-berlin.mpg.de/de/aktuelles/aktuelle-forschungsergebnisse/besatzungsmacht-musik (2012)
Deutschland 1945 – »Stunde Null« der Popmusik? Brüche und Kontinuitäten in Jazz und Schlager der Nachkriegszeit, in M&R Melodie und Rhythmus 4/2015, S. 73f. (Juli/August 2015)
Articles on contemporary musicians in the ‘Sketches’ section of the website.
