Name: Johanna Burnheart
Occupation: Violinist, composer
Nationality: German
Current release: Johanna Burnheart's new full-length album Bär, is out December 1st 2023 via her own Burnheart Records.
Recommendations: One of the few jazz violin idols I have is Zbigniew Seifert. His story is truly inspirational and what he created during his lifetime is a big reminder to make the music you want to make, regardless of trends and money pressure. His last album Passion, released in 1979 with a mega lineup, is extremely special and rare. Here is the title track.
Also, I don’t know how I missed this record so far, but I only just came across Don Cherry’s Brown Rice album released in 1975 this year and I absolutely love it. So here is the title track in case you have not heard it.

If you enjoyed this interview with Johanna Burnheart and would like to stay up to date with her work, visit her official homepage. Or check out her profiles on Instagram, Soundcloud, and Facebook for recent updates. We also have a previous 15 Questions Johanna Burnheart interview for an even deeper dive.

We also have conversations with her about her relationship with the violin and how to listen to improvisation.



Do you think that some of your earliest musical experiences planted a seed for your interest in improvisation?

I think my interest in improvisation lies within my personality and not so much my early musical experiences. I am often hungry for a change of pace, unexpected turns and unusual ways of living which to me is very connected to the artistic sense of improvising.

I was fully prepared to follow the normal path of a classical violinist until I stopped to think about what that would actually look like. The lack of personal artistic expression as an orchestra musician and the fact, that I didn’t actually listen to classical music in my spare time convinced me that I needed to find an alternative path.

I attribute this decision to my personality and to what I expect from life on the whole. Our first chapter in life is dictated by education which you can’t improvise to your own specific needs usually so I cherish the fact that I can shape my days however I please as a self-employed person at this time. For most of us, our professional lives are spent working for others and arranging yourself within the new structure you join once you finish education.

I need freedom over my time to create the music I want to create. So I work hard to be able to maintain this way of life. I think a lot of us would be more creative if we had a different work life culture.

When did you first consciously start getting interested in musical improvisation?  Which artists, teachers, albums or performances involving prominent use of improvisation captured your imagination in the beginning?

I only started showing interest in improvisation at age 16 actually. I was listening to a lot of Billie Holiday, Art Tatum and Thelonious Monk at the time and it changed my musical focus forever. My uncle was a professional jazz vibraphonist so I had heard his music all of my young life without ever thinking about it more deeply.

I was playing the violin and the piano as a child and studying all the traditional classical repertoire so I never stopped to think about improvisation until my teens. My uncle gave me my first jazz CD when I was very young which at the time I did not understand how to listen to at all. It was Reflections by Abdullah Ibrahim (then Dollar Brand) which is a brilliant record and I came back to it during my teens to discover how much I loved it.



I can’t say whether this record influenced my taste or not, but to this day, solo jazz piano records are some of my all time favourite records to listen to.

Derek Bailey defined improvising as the search for material which is endlessly transformable. What kind of materials have turned to be particularly transformable and stimulating for you?

Focussing on rhythm was most transformative for me. I was always drawn to rhythmically interesting but melodically more simple solos by other players such as Miles Davis. His Cool Jazz era solos were very influential to me.



As a string player you can play continuously without taking a breath which can be our biggest downfall when improvising. As if you’re writing a book with sentences that are 2 pages long.

So rhythmic shapes that then get elevated by melodic content have generally been my focus. They keep my own attention much more than when I get swept away in a flurry of virtuosic phrases and techniques. This focus was expanded by my use of pedals, especially ones that work with rhythmic textures.

The delay on pedals and the time it takes for certain sounds to build is something I love to listen to and wait for when I play. It’s a great way of being able to enjoy and listen to myself while I improvise.

Do you feel as though there are at least elements of composition and improvisation which are entirely unique to each? Based on your own work or maybe performances or recordings by other artists, do you feel that there are results which could only have happened through one of them?

Wayne Shorter once said “Composing is improvisation slowed down.” For me the two are very intertwined but yield very different results. On the surface, the most unique element of each is the setting. I tend to compose in solitude whereas improvisation is more of a group activity.

It’s a difficult question you’re posing as I would generally state that the results of each are certainly unique, but then we know of great jazz musicians such as Ella Fitzgerald prewriting her solos before a performance, yielding brilliant results and still giving us the same feeling as if she freely improvised these on the spot.

Or if considering Wayne Shorter’s quote as proof that composing is improvising fundamentally, it would mean Dvořák composing the New World Symphony was in fact an improvisation that was perfected and orchestrated.



And if we go further - we practise improvising by learning language, copying licks, transcribing and playing famous solos in every key to be versatile. All of this is technically previously composed. So should we now say composition is at the root of improvisation? I think I could get lost in an endless cycle in this question.

When you're improvising, does it actually feel like you're inventing something on the spot – or are you inventively re-arranging patterns from preparations, practise or previous performances? What balance is there between forgetting and remembering in your work?

I don’t always feel I’m inventing something on the spot as most things I play sound very familiar to me. My ear already knows what I’m going to be playing next. Everything is rooted in the things you’ve practised and heard before I believe.

Obviously there is an incredible amount of pattern possibilities but we all find our favourites and settle these into our autopilot. But I usually challenge myself to go against my autopilot and try to surprise myself during my solos. So it’s not so much forgetting but remembering and then going away from it to change what I know.

I hope to ever evolve my autopilot and my sound because those artists who reinvent themselves throughout their careers are most inspiring to me as a listener.

In terms of your personal expression and the experience of performance, how does playing solo compare to group improvisations?

It is a much more introspective experience when improvising in a solo setting. There is nothing reactive playing along with me so everything is on me and my own expression on those occasions.

I am a perfectionist when it comes to my compositions so when playing solo, I have perfectly prepared everything I am playing along to which takes away the element of being on the lookout for potential “mistakes” happening in the band that create an unexpected change. These “mistakes” on the other hand are of course some of the best things that happen when playing live with a band.

Reacting to shifts in the band and vice versa, having other players react / respond to something that is happening in my solo is incredibly exciting and keeps the music active.

In the, to you, best improvisations, do you feel a strong sense of personal presence or do you (or your ego) “disappear”?  

I feel a strong sense of personal presence I would say. My instrument is my mode of expression and it is very personal to me. So playing freely during an improvisation is always a true representation of where I am at with my mood, my technique, my practice, and my personality on the whole that day.

Sometimes it can also be a welcome mood shift that only happens once I improvise which can take me by surprise.

In a live situation, decisions between creatives often work without words. From your experience and current projects, what does this process feel like and how does it work?

It can lead to high stress levels to decide on something in the moment especially if something unexpected happens within the band. So far I’ve been lucky enough to play with experienced players so any wordless decisions on stage have always panned out in the end.

The culture around jazz gigs has changed in the past few decades which is something that is important to note. We used to have big bands, small and large ensembles play on month long tours and doing residencies in specific clubs for weeks on end which would lead to an incredibly well-rehearsed and tight group musically speaking.

At this point, we are lucky to be touring with improvised music even just for a few days as it tends to not be financially viable. And residencies in the same club, which used to be the norm, are now generally speaking a three night appearance maximum. This creates a different musical output. Everyone plays with a larger amount of different musicians or does other jobs on the side to support live gigs so we don’t have the opportunity to play with the same constellation for weeks and really start diving deep with the material and the players.

This also has an impact on recording as we often go into the studio with minimal rehearsal time and without having toured the music beforehand. It changes how prepared we are for the unexpected so when things have to be decided on the spot without words, you can only rely on your own instinct and hope your fellow musicians had compatible instincts on their end.

Stewart Copeland said: “Listening is where the cool stuff comes from. And that listening thing, magically, turns all of your chops into gold.” What do you listen for?

I firstly listen to the bass. It is the anchor and plays within my favourite frequencies. During my solos I like to send little rhythmic messages to the drummer to see if they will respond to me. I have certain drummers I love playing with for this reason. Once I play a small rhythmic phrase, I immediately receive a rhythmic response from these drummers particularly. I love those moments especially.

Apart from this I of course listen to the harmony instrument to see what they’re doing to support my playing and fill the space.

There can be surprising moments during improvisations – from one of the performers not playing a single note to another shaking up a quiet section with an outburst of noise. Have you been part of similar situations and how did they impact the performance from your point of view?

My band did a live video performance for an online festival in 2021 and somehow, when it came to one of the keys’ solos, both drums and bass dropped out at the same time. None of us had performed with other people in months of course and this particular composition was in a tricky metre so it was certainly a hard test for my keys player who was actually filling in for the person who had recorded the album with us.

We were only a quartet so he was left playing completely on his own. But once you’ve dropped out, you can’t just suddenly come back in because you realise it was a mistake. It has to musically make sense to come back in. So my keys player had to keep the form and metre by himself for 32 bars until everyone could come back in. We hadn’t rehearsed much before either so it was a bit of a cold bath. I’m not sure if the audience necessarily noticed that this wasn’t an easy moment for my keys player but he is an incredible player and just pulled through by himself.

These moments make a performance quite electric but while you’re in it it’s definitely nerve-wracking.

In a way, improvisations remind us of the transitory nature of life. When an improvisation ends, is it really gone, just like a cup of coffee? Or does it live on in some form?

I think for most people, the specifics of a live improvisation during a concert that doesn’t get recorded, is gone after it’s over.

But what’s left are the emotions we went through when listening to it. So I feel that means it does live on it that form.