Simon Popp – dr, fx, comp
Simon Popp Trio
Simon Popp – dr, electronics
Sebastian Wolfgruber – dr
Flurin Mück – dr
Simon Popp is nominated for the German Jazz Award 2025!
The Munich-based percussionist and composer Simon Popp navigates polyrhythmic structures with a keen sense of timing and mood. He contrasts earthy and airy sounds, blurring the boundaries between the electronic and acoustic worlds, making a powerful statement about what contemporary drumming music can be today: A rich soundscape that utilizes the full spectrum of all percussion instruments. Sometimes driving, sometimes meditative.
Popp, also known as a member of the jazz quintet FAZER, studied jazz drumming in Munich and creates his very own category of non-category with his music, ” […] which derives its strength precisely from the fact that it deliberately does not clearly locate itself between jazz, pop or world music. And this is precisely what makes Simon Popp one of the most exciting drummers in Munich at the moment.” (Süddeutsche Zeitung). With his other projects 9ms, POEJI and POLYGONIA & POPP, he creates interfaces between jazz, ambient and electronic music.
In 2023, Simon Popp was awarded the City of Munich’s Music Promotion Prize.
“Simon Popp is one of Fazer’s drummers. Influenced by percussionist of the east he just did his thing and recorded an album of immense deepness and rhythmical convergence. I’m collecting these obscure drummer solo records for years and then a young men comes along and makes them all sound boring.”
Growing Bin Records 2019
“The Munich based musician weaves a tapestry of wondroud melodies and percussive elements across a record which is as deep and poetic as it is danceable.”
Ramson Note 2021
The new album TRIO (Squama Recordings) will be released on September 19, 2025!
Together with the two exceptional drummers Flurin Mück (CH) and Sebastian Wolfgruber (DE), Popp has already presented his drum trio on numerous stages including Überjazz Hamburg, Leipziger Jazztage and Studio 2 of Bayerischer Rundfunk. The drum trio, led by Munich-based drummer and composer Simon Popp, plays its way through polyrhythmic structures with a fine sense of timing and mood. It contrasts earthy and airy sounds, blurs the boundaries between the electronic and acoustic worlds and makes a powerful statement about what contemporary percussion music can be today: A rich soundscape that makes use of the full range of all percussion instruments.
Popp’s albums LAYA (2019), DEVI (2021) and BLIZZ (2022) were well received internationally, especially in the vinyl scene. The Line Of Best Fit praised his work, stating: “This is music you can get totally lost in, where the lines between organic and electric are blurred so as to be indistinguishable.” Along with recognition from magazines such as Clash, Juno and Ransom Note, Bleep noted that his music reminded them of the experimental giants Philip Glass and Steve Reich.
“Simon Popp (…) is a German drummer who has taken the art of percussion to new extremes, using a plethora of different instruments – balaphon, idiophones, steel drums and all kinds of bells and bowls – and production techniques to create individual, original music.”
Juno 2021
“With “Blizz”, Popp opens up a whole new category of non-category. Whether it’s jazz or world music or pop – it doesn’t matter anyway. Simon Popp has a pretty precise idea of the world of sound into which he invites us.”
BR Classic 2022
