Jaimie Branch


Jaimie Breezy Branch is an American jazz trumpeter and composer.

Biography

Branch was born in Huntington, New York and started playing trumpet at age nine when she moved to Wilmette, a suburb of Chicago. She attended the New England Conservatory of Music.
Later, Branch moved back to Chicago, working as a musician, organizer, and sound engineer on the local music scene, including with Jason Ajemian, Keefe Jackson's Project Project, and Tim Daisy' s New Fracture Quartet, Anton Hatwich, and Ken Vandermark. She performed in Chicago and New York with her trio Princess, Princess, with bassist Toby Summerfield and drummer Frank Rosaly, and in trios with Tim Daisy and Daniel Levin, Matt Schneider, and Jason Adasiewicz, and with Chris Velkommen and Sam Weinberg. Together with Jason Stein, Jeb Bishop, and Jason Roebke, she founded the band Block and Tackle. She played on five albums between 2006 and 2008.
In 2012 Branch moved to Baltimore, where she worked toward a master's degree in Jazz performance from Towson University. At this time she also founded the record label Pionic Records, which released the music of her group Bomb Shelter. In 2015 Branch moved to New York, where she has worked with Fred Lonberg-Holm and Mike Pride among others. In addition, she performed on albums with the independent rock groups Never Enough Hope, Local H and Atlas Math. As of 2016, she worked in a quartet with Chad Taylor, Jason Ajemian and Tomeka Reid, as well as with Mike Pride, Shayna Dulberger and Weasel Walter, and with Yoni Kretzmer and Tobey Cederberg. In 2017 she released her debut solo album, Fly or Die, with Tomeka Reid, Jason Ajemian, Chad Taylor, Matt Schneider, Ben LaMar Gay, and Josh Berman.
Branch has cited Don Cherry, Axel Dörner, Booker Little, and Miles Davis among her musical influences.

Discography (in selection)

Albums as bandleader

; Keefe Jacksons Project, with Dave Rempis, Guillermo Gregorio, Anton Hatwich, Jason Stein, James Falzone, Frank Rosaly, Josh Berman, Jeb Bishop, Nick Broste, and Marc Unternährer
; New Fracture Quartet, with Nate McBride, Tim Daisy, and Dave Miller
; Predella Group, with Nate McBride, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Tim Daisy, Jeff Parker, Ken Vandermark, and Jeb Bishop
; Bullet Hell, with Jakob Kart and Theodore Representerer
; Beyond All Things, with Chris Welcome and others
; Anteloper, with Jason Nazary
; Party Knüllers X Jaimie Branch
; Ig Henneman, Jaimie Branch & Anne La Berge
; An Unruly Manifesto, with James Brandon Lewis and others