Thomas Lehn

German Experimental Electronic Musician

Pianist and analogue synthesizer player Thomas Lehn is a composer-performer of contemporary music. His academic education enfolds studies of recording engineering at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold in Germany in 1979-1980 as well as classical and as jazz piano at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz in Cologne 1980-1987. Since the 1980s he has been performing as an interpreting pianist, both, contemporary new music including numerous first performances and traditional composed music of the classical/romantical period. Parallel to this work as a pianist, since the early 1990s he extensively developed activities in international colloborations as a performer of live-electronic music based on the sound synthesis of analogue synthesizers of the late 1960s, utilizing almost exclusively the EMS Synthi A. Performing majorly his own electronic music, he has been extending his work by live- and studio-produced synthesizer interpretations of electronic compositions by composers like Boguslav Schaeffer, Éliane Radigue, Peter Jakober, Anthony Pateras a.m.o. . International collaborations enclosure long term and newer ensembles as well as involvements in numerous specific projects employing either merely music, or, music in combination with other artistic practices (dance, film, video, multimedia, performance etc.). Long term working ensembles include the trios KONK PACK, TOOT, THERMAL, the duos works with Marcus Schmickler, Tiziana Bertoncini, Gerry Hemingway, Paul Lovens, Frédéric Blondy Urs Leimgruber and John Butcher, as well as other formations like MIMEO, SPEAK EASY, SHIFT, 6IX, a.m.o. Furthermore, he is pianist and founding member of the ensemble]h[iatus, a project dedicated to the both practices of interpratation and improvisation. More recently established ensembles are the duos with the video artist Kjell Bjørgeengen and percussionist Roger Turner, as well as two trio formations shared together with John Butcher involving the pianists John Tilbury and Matthew Shipp.