Meinrad Kneer

German double bass player, composer and improviser Meinrad Kneer operates on the borders of jazz, improvised, ethnic and contemporary music. After his school years and civil service he studied Biology at the University of Tübingen. From 1995 till 1999 he studied music and double bass in the Netherlands and ever-since he is present and active in the Dutch music scene and abroad. Next to Amsterdam, he established in 2010 a second home base in Berlin/ Germany, therefore he is present in both cities/ regions and their vivid music scenes.

Between 1998 and 2005 he co-led the quartet and septet Dalgoo together with reed player Tobias Klein. He was awarded the prestigious ‘Jur Naessens Music Award’ in 2002 with the septet Dalgoo - New Anatomy, a project around the work of Russian absurdist and writer Daniil Charms.

Currently he is involved as a (co-) leader in groups such as the trio Baars/ Kneer/ Elgart, the piano trio Veenendaal/ Kneer/ Sun (“...one of Holland’s most interesting contemporary jazz groups” - Ken Vos, draaiomjeoren.nl), the quartet Klare/ Platz/ Kneer/ Elgart and Spoon 3.

As a sideman in demand he plays with groups such as: Baraná Quintet, Bite the Gnatze, Carrousel, Playstation 6, Gravitones and the Berlin based group The Tigers of Love. He has played with a wide variety of Dutch groups and projects such as Barana & Co, the Astronotes, the AXYZ-Ensemble, the Joost Buis Tentet, the bigtet Tetzepi, the Ab Baars Quartet, Roomtone and the Henneman String-quartet.

He has performed with among others, Najma Akhtar, Johannes Bauer, Han Bennink, Tony Buck, Tobias Delius, Bill Elgart, Fred Frith, Touria Hadraoui, Tristan Honsinger, Anne la Berge, Paul Lovens, Roscoe Mitchell, Saadet Türköz, Michael Vatcher and Corrie van Binsbergen.

In the past years he has been touring big parts of Western and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Turkey, Morocco, Norway and Mexico. Since 2001 his work as a composer has been supported by the ’Performing Arts Fund’.
In late 2006 he co-founded together with pianist Albert van Veenendaal the independent label Evil Rabbit Records.
Together with flutist Mark Alban Lotz he organizes a creative music series for free improvisation: u-ex(perimental), which takes place monthly in the Centraal Museum in Utrecht, the Netherlands.