Louis Winsberg

Born in Marseille in 1963, Louis Winsberg develops very early a playing style nourished by jazz, classical guitar and the Gypsy musics of southern France, a Mediterranean anchorage that runs through his entire oeuvre. Based in Paris at the end of the 1970s, he becomes known on the jazz scene in the early 1980s, notably after winning the first prize for soloist at the La Défense national jazz competition in 1983, then as a founding member of Sixun in 1984 alongside Jean-Pierre Como, Paco Séry, Michel Alibo, Alain Debiossat and Abdou M'Boup. With this group, Louis Winsberg participates in the rise of a fusion jazz open to African rhythms, electric circuits and collective improvisation, from Nuit Blanche in 1985 to Unixsity in 2022. In parallel, Louis Winsberg pursues a personal trajectory centered on crossings between jazz, flamenco and Mediterranean musics, with albums such as Camino (1990), La Danse du Vent (1997), Jaleo (2001), Le Bal des Suds (2005), Marseille Marseille (2011), Gypsy Eyes (2014), Temps réel (2021) and Le Monde à l’envers (2022). His projects often take the form of trios, quartets or collectives where strings, voices and percussion dialogue, in a writing attentive to timbre and rhythm. Over the years, Louis Winsberg has also collaborated with Dee Dee Bridgewater, Sylvain Luc, André Charlier and Benoît Sourisse.