Herb stake

Helmut "Herb" Runge (born February 3, 1937 ; † January 16, 2017 in Berlin ) was a German jazz and entertainment musician ( trumpet , arrangement , orchestral direction).

Career

Runge, who first completed an apprenticeship as an electrician , then learned trumpet at the conservatory , influenced by Louis Armstrong . He started performing in the mid-1950s. In the early 1960s he played regularly in Berlin's jazz clubs and founded his own student band . He won jazz prizes and was brought into the RIAS dance orchestra . Then he worked as a ship musician on cruise ships until 1970. In the next few years he also appeared as a pop singer in the duo Steffi & Steve (single: "We turn the world upside down").

Since the early 1980s he has performed with his Herb Runge Orchestra at the Berlin Press Ball for almost 20 years; he also accompanied the band Harald Juhnke ; there were also performances with Lou van Burg and Billy Mo as well as with Vico Torriani . He arranged Ravel's Boléro as "Swinging Bolero" and also wrote arrangements for the RIAS Big Band.

In 1989 he took over the leadership of the BSR Big Band, a former amateur orchestra of the Berliner Stadtreinigung , which he formed into a professional ensemble that no longer only appeared at company events, but above all at six-day races and numerous balls. In 1998 the orchestra was dissolved. Runge now played small concerts here and there and wrote a song for Hertha 03 Zehlendorf . For his 70th birthday he organized another big band.

Web links

• Obituary (Clean Times)
• Jazz? Dawste poor Der Tagesspiegel , May 25, 2017
• Herb Runge at Discogs (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Musicians now have to work in the administration: Stadtreinigung gets rid of their big band Berliner Zeitung , July 28, 1998
2. ↑ Berlin's master of dance music Herb Runge celebrates anniversary Die Welt , December 19, 2007