Regina Mester studied classical piano and voice in Duesseldorf. This is where she had her first contact with jazz and big band singing in the RSI-Big Band of the music academy.
After graduating as a piano teacher she studied jazz voice in Den Haag with Majorie Barnes and Rachel Gould.
She successfully completed master classes with Ursula Dudziak, Georgie Fame, Mark Murphy, and Judy Niemak, to mention a few.
She has performed as a singer with numerous ensembles, duos as well as big bands (e.g. the Big Band of the German Armed Forces, the Ford Big Band of Cologne under Jiggs Whigham, the Big Band Convention in Cologne.)
She teaches voice and piano, organizes workshops, and works as a vocal coach in the production of musicals. She composes music, writes lyrics, and arranges music, mainly for her own bands.
During her studies in the Netherlands she organized the
Regina Mester Quintett whose members were
Marc van Roon -
piano
Maarten Ornstein -
sax
Tony Overwater -
bass
Wim Kegel -
drums.
While working with this band she wrote her first own lyrics to the music of Tony Overwater and played her first own compositions.
She participated in the project
Motion Music under the direction of Tony Overwater.
With her
RM4 band she primarily performed jazz standards. Band members were
Wim Bronneberg -
guitar
Jo Didderen -
bass
Erik Nijhoff -
drums
Nils Tausk -
trumpet.
During several summers she toured the South of France with this band.
Later she formed the
Regina Mester Trio, the musicians being
Christian Oschem -
guitar
Markus Quabeck / Urs Wieghager -
bass
who were joined by Stephan Schneider -
drums.
During her time with the trio she continued to compose her own jazz music.
At the same time she performed as the singer of the
Lowlife-Trio whose members were
Odilo Clausnitzer -
horn
Dietmar Kruse -
posaune
Markus Quabeck -
bass.
In 2008 she organized a new band whose members were
Marcus Schinkel -
piano
Martin Gjakonowski -
bass
Stephan Schneider -
drums.
She produced a CD album with her favorite songs to which she contributed 3 songs of her own.
For this album she was able to get the trumpetist
Frederik Köster to join the band. The
CD "
where do we go ",
which is dedicated to her father, was released in December 2008.