1991
Theresia Philipp, born in 1991 in Großröhrsdorf (Saxony), understands music as a social space – a place where connection is created both among musicians and between performers and audience. Her artistic thinking is rooted in openness: towards her own experiences as well as those of others, their stories and perspectives.
This attitude developed early on in an environment shaped by ideas of emancipation and equality that were still present in the school system of her youth in post-GDR Saxony. “As musicians, all genders were treated equally.” Listening without (male) dominance thus became a fundamental principle of her artistic work – a principle that still defines her approach today: making space.
1998
She began playing keyboard at the age of seven, switching to saxophone at ten and becoming active in the marching band of her hometown. For a long time, however, she searched in vain for strong non-male role models, especially on her main instrument.
“Only in recent years did I realize that female saxophonists have always existed – they just weren’t (or barely) visible.”
As a saxophonist, composer, arranger and artistic director of the German National Youth Jazz Orchestra, she consciously positions herself against this form of marginalization and invisibility.
2007
At the age of thirteen, she moved to the renowned Sächsisches Landesgymnasium für Musik Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden. From 2007 to 2011 she was a member of the Saxony State Youth Jazz Orchestra, followed by two years in the German National Youth Jazz Orchestra (BuJazzO).
After graduating, she relocated to Cologne to study at the University of Music and Dance. Philipp has since become a distinctive voice within the city’s music scene, performing in numerous constellations and collaborating with a wide range of artists, including her own trio Pollon (with Thomas Sauerborn and David Helm) and projects such as bört, initiated by Lukas Keller, as well as working with musicians like Sebastian Gramss and others.
As a composer, she contributed to the collective work Music From Kylwiria, a tribute to György Ligeti at the Moers Festival, and is currently working on a composition for the EOS Chamber Orchestra.
Her saxophone playing and compositional approach are not defined by genre boundaries but by a sense of elasticity – the ability to bring together apparent opposites such as energy and intimacy, to articulate ruptures, and to weave sound worlds between classical and contemporary music.
In collaboration with the Goethe-Institut, she has been invited to Namibia and Iraq, where she worked with local musicians and engaged in cultural exchange.
2020
In 2020, she received the Horst and Gretl Will Scholarship of the City of Cologne, followed by the WDR Jazz Prize in 2022 and the German Jazz Prize in 2023 for her co-composition with and for the MDR Radio Choir.
Since 2023, she has been an artist in the NICA artist development programme at Stadtgarten Cologne, the European Centre for Jazz and Contemporary Music.
2026
A major milestone in her career is her appointment as artistic director of the German National Youth Jazz Orchestra. Together with co-director Jörn Marcussen Wulff, she develops an ambitious programme each year with 19 selected music students from across Germany.
Her ideas of community, open communication and anti-hierarchical music-making form the core of the ensemble’s collaborative process.
