Florian Weber

Weber was born on 11 November 1977 in Detmold. His family was musical: "his father was a music professor and his mother an opera singer. He began learning the piano at the age of four and had played in both classical and jazz ensembles by the time he left high school." In 1999, he received a scholarship to attend Berklee College of Music in Boston. Later, he studied with John Taylor in Cologne, Joanne Brackeen and Paul Bley in Boston, and Richie Beirach and Lee Konitz in New York. ==Career==

Together with bassist Jeff Denson and drummer Ziv Ravitz, Weber founded Minsarah (Hebrew for "prism") in 2002. They began to tour, mainly in the United States. Their first CD, Deep Lee, was released by Enja Records around 2008. A concert was recorded and released as New Quartet Live at the Village Vanguard. In 2011, Weber founded a group called Biosphere with Lionel Loueke (guitar), Thomas Morgan (bass) and Dan Weiss (drums). ==Awards and honors==

In 2013, Weber received an Echo Music Prize for best instrumentalist of the year (piano/keyboard). In January 2014, he received the WDR Jazz Prize for jazz improvisation. ==Discography==