Double Bass | 1946–2024

Danielsson's value to the musicians he worked with was summed up by Manfred Eicher as "a very special sense of soulfulness and precision, and his determination to serve the whole band sound." He grew up in Stockholm, studied at the Royal Academy of Music, sharpened his ear at the Gyllene Cirkeln club accompanying visiting Americans through the 1960s, and played with Bill Evans at nineteen. His ECM career began with the Jan Garbarek and Bobo Stenson Quartet recordings of 1974, particularly "Witchi-Tai-To" (ECM, 1974), whose warm-toned, spacious approach to post-bop became one of the defining sounds of the Scandinavian jazz scene. That record brought him to Keith Jarrett's attention, and from 1974 to 1979 Danielsson, Garbarek, and drummer Jon Christensen formed Jarrett's European quartet, recording "Belonging" (ECM, 1974) and "My Song" (ECM, 1977) among others. He spent subsequent decades as a freelance presence across the ECM catalogue, appearing on records by Charles Lloyd, Michel Petrucciani, Enrico Rava, Tomasz Stanko, and Peter Erskine, always anchoring the group without obscuring it. He died in Stockholm in May 2024.