Professional double and electric bass player and senior lecturer in music (ensembles, improvisation, composition, 1 to 1 lessons) at Leeds Conservatoire.

James was born in Dudley, England in 1991. He has studied in Birmingham, Paris and Berlin, and is now based between Berlin and the UK, working around Europe as a musician (double/electric bass), educator and composer.

He performs mostly in fields of jazz, improvised and contemporary music as a soloist, sideman and bandleader and employs a holistic and collaborative approach to music making.

Awards:

• Studio Award Berlin Senate Department of Culture and Europe
• Elsa Neumann Stipendium 2018 from the Berlin University of the Arts/Hanns Eisler
• Making Music’s Adopt a Composer scheme in partnership with Sound and Music, PRS Foundation and BBC Radio 3
• Kulturprojekte Berlin Scholarship to develop a new duo project with US based soprano Stephanie Lamprea plus guests from Berlin/NYC

Selected performances include: Proms at Royal Albert Hall, Birmingham Symphony Hall, London Jazz Festival, Konzerthaus Berlin.

Selected broadcasts/recordings include: BBC Radio 3, Kulturradio RBB, BR-Klassik, Deutschlandfunk Kultur – for discography please visit my website!

Tutoring Experience:

• Fully DBS checked
• Training/experience in remote teaching and learning, 1 to 1 and groups (Leeds Conservatoire)

Senior Lecturer at Leeds Conservatoire (double/electric bass, ensemble, improvisation, composition, across all genres). Saturday Music School at LCoM (group double bass lessons and ensemble, ages 9-13).

Composer in Residence with award-winning creative enterprise Make The Paint Dance Workshop leader for Jazzlines (THSH Birmingham, ages 8-18). 10 years of private tuition in double bass, electric bass and composition

Current students include: bass ukulele, actor musicians (double and electric bass).

Music Qualifications & Achievements:

• University of the Arts Berlin (2016) – Music [Composition and Bass] (Masters)
• Birmingham Conservatoire (2014) – BMus (Hons) Jazz Double Bass (Bachelors)