Steffen Kuehn was born and raised in Germany and began playing the trumpet at the age of eight. Twenty years later he received his Bachelor of Music from the prestigious University of North Texas in 1993, majoring in Jazz Trumpet and Jazz Studies.
While at North Texas, he received two Down Beat awards for being a member of the ‘Two O’clock Lab Band’ that was voted ‘Best College/University Band’ in 1991 and 1993.
After working on cruise ships and a 3 year stint back in Munich, Germany, he decided to make the San Francisco Bay Area his permanent home. Concentrating on his playing and songwriting, the move proved to have been the perfect decision.
Soon after his arrival in the Bay Area he hooked up with LA publisher Monica Benson
who started signing Steffen’s music to her company ‘Wild Pink Music’. The first big breakthrough came with placing the original composition ‘trumpop’ in the Miramax movie ‘Birthday Girl’, starring Nicole Kidman and Ben Chaplin.
Being interested in Straight Ahead Jazz, Smooth Jazz as well as in Latin Jazz and Salsa, Steffen scored big in 2002 with the CD release ‘Now or Later” of his Jazz Nonet, that featured 2001 Grammy Nominee Tim Hagans. That year also marked the inception of his own record label ‘stefrecords’.
Fast forward to 2005: Having joined the Latin Jazz orchestra of legendary timbalero Louie Romero, the band recorded its first album ‘Timbalero’ and released it on ‘stefrecords’ in 2006 to rave reviews.
In the meantime Steffen kept writing and recording for his 2nd release, entitled ‘trumpop’…
Having secured the producing/engineering skills of Peter Horvath (keyboardist with Victor Bailey) and guitarist Ray Obiedo (Herbie Hancock, George Duke), this record shaped up to make some big waves…..
Since it’s release in March 2008, the CD ‘trumpop’ has been in the Smoothjazz.com Top 50 Indie Radio Charts for 20 consecutive weeks and has received over 3000 airplays nationally and worldwide (October 2008). Furthermore, Steffen’s song ‘One for Louie’ (from the ‘Timbalero’ CD) was placed in the USA Cable Network summer blockbuster series ‘Burn Notice’, airing in January 2009 (it also charted at No. 2 in ‘Latinbeat Magazine in 2007). 4 more songs off the ‘trumpop’ release have been signed to Monica Benson’s ‘Wild Pink Music’ company.
Steffen has headlined and/or performed at many festivals and major clubs internationally and nationally such as the San Jose Jazz Festival, San Francisco Jazz Festival, Yoshi's Oakland, The Knitting Factory, Kuumbwa Jazz, Jazz & Blues By The Bay, Yoshi's San Francisco, Oakland City Center Fall Music Jazz Series, Jazz at Pearl’s and many others…..
Steffen Kuehn must be considered as one of the rising stars in today’s popular Jazz music with a unique voice that has and will appeal to many music lovers around the globe!
‘stefrecord’ Label Discography:
‘Steffen Kuehn Nonet’- ‘Now Or Later’ featuring 2001 Grammy Nominee Tim Hagans (September 2002).
‘Louie Romero Y Su Grupo Mazacote’ – ‘Timbalero’
(October 2006)
‘Steffen Kuehn’ – ‘Trumpop’ (March 2008)
He has studied with Jazz greats such as:
Tim Hagans
Brian Lynch
Claudio Roditi.
He has performed for, recorded and/or worked with (selection):
The Platters
Marilyn McCoo
John Handy
Mark Levine
Chico Freeman
Tim Hagans
Ray Obiedo
Kenny Werner
Ray DeLa Paz
The Temptations
The 4 Tops
Ray Sepulveda
Lydia Pense & Cold Blood
Brian Culbertson
In Europe, he played as a sideman for:
Dusko Gojkovich Big Band
Al Porcino Big Band
Conexion Latina and others.
Other credits include the following Broadway Musical Productions:
Annie
Damn Yankees
Phantom of the Opera
42nd Street
Evita among others.
Trying to stay busy Steffen ..and you? I'm going out on tour next week.. but would love to talk to you about this other project Im working on .I hope everything is beautiful with you my freind.
Hi Mr. Kuehn! looks like your are onto big things :) Maybe I will come and see you perform this time rather than seeing you teach. haha i like your songs, they are very catchy!
hey man ya bet ya cant guess who worked a clinic with us a few days ago. Gordon Goodwin himself. Got a few autographed things from him,and not only that he played a guess concert at chabot college and it was swinging man. wish you were there i know you woulda appreciated it
Hey Steffen, I'll be back in the Bay Area the whole first week of April 09. Playing all over the extended bay: Stanford, UC Davis, Modesto, Santa Cruz, & the SF Fillmore. What's been going on with you?
