Jens Rosteck

Dr. Jens Rosteck (b. 1962, Hameln) is a versatile German author, musicologist, cultural historian, pianist, and biographer. He studied musicology, German literature, and comparative literature at the Free University of Berlin, earning his doctorate in 1993 with a dissertation on Darius Milhaud’s Paul Claudel operas. Since the 1990s, Rosteck has lived and worked as an independent writer, researcher, and publicist in France and Germany, with extended periods in Paris, Nice, and now Offenburg.

Rosteck is recognized as a leading specialist in the music and cultural history of modern France, particularly the Groupe des Six-a collective of early 20th-century French composers including Darius Milhaud, Francis Poulenc, Arthur Honegger, Georges Auric, Louis Durey, and Germaine Tailleferre. His research and literary interests span topography, the dynamics of collective and individual creativity, and the phenomenon of “positive exile.” In this context, he was awarded a guest fellowship at Villa Aurora in Los Angeles in 2007.

As an author, Rosteck has published numerous acclaimed biographies and city portraits, including dual biographies of Lotte Lenya and Kurt Weill (Zwei auf einer Insel, 1999) and Jane and Paul Bowles (Leben ohne anzuhalten, 2005), as well as monographs on Bob Dylan, Oscar Wilde, Hans Werner Henze (Rosen und Revolutionen, 2009), Édith Piaf, and Jacques Brel, alongside portraits of Paris, Nice, and Ibiza. His works are published by renowned houses and have been translated into several languages.

Rosteck’s oeuvre encompasses some 250 publications: essays, encyclopedia and conference contributions, articles for commemorative volumes and anthologies, as well as a wide range of journalistic and scholarly articles. He is also an editor of Urtext editions, a sought-after speaker at international conferences, and performs regularly as a pianist, including as a duo partner with Diana Bickley.

For his interdisciplinary work, Rosteck has received numerous grants and awards, including research stays at the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel and the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme in Paris. In 2021, he was elected to the German PEN Center, and in 2022, he became a founding member of PEN Berlin.