German-born composer, multi-instrumentalist & artist Mathias Baumann has been learning and playing music since he was five years old.

Matt studied Jazz Performance in Ireland’s Newpark Music Centre - now part of DCU. He is, and always has been involved in a diversity of music projects within different styles and genre. As part of an Irish art project he co-exhibited at idir's multidisciplinary 'group Ego Trip 1' in New York which was funded by Culture Ireland and supported by NYFA.

He published two Jazz albums 'Expectations' and 'The World Is Coming Together' and his music and projects have been featured on Irish Television and Radio.

His song 'Take It Or Leave It' won 'The Akademia Music Awards' for 'Best Instrumental / Jazz Song'.

In 2024 he was awarded the RIAM Teacher Spotlight Award.

At the start of June 2025 he released his latest single and short film ‘Panoramic Preview’ which is a visual prelude of his upcoming project 'Sonic Landscapes', a deeply personal journey & a vision for connection. It aims to foster a renewed sense of shared identity on the island of Ireland & beyond, bridging geographic, cultural & political boundaries through the universal language of music & the emotional resonance of visual storytelling.

Influences / Sounds like: Mike Oldfield, John Barry, Pink Floyd, Snarky Puppy, Cinematic Orchestra, Steven Wilson, The Alan Parsons Project, Pat Metheny, and many more...

Every time I watched one of my uncle’s or great cousin’s gigs, I had the same thought running through my head:
“I want to be up there. I want to play music for all these people.”

Music was everywhere in my childhood. It ran through the bloodlines on both sides of my family like a river — wild and alive. My grandfather played drums and keyboard. His father had a harmonica always nearby. One of my uncles could switch between tenor sax, alto sax, clarinet, guitar, piano — you name it. Another uncle played trumpet, the list goes on...

My dad? He started as a piano builder and tuner and played organ, accordion and was a singer in two bands. Though he eventually left music to become a physiotherapist, the music never left him. My mother played mandolin and guitar as a teenager.

So, it felt only natural that I started playing piano at five. I grew up in a small town called Nassau — one of those places where everyone knows everyone, and probably their pets too. My parents found a private teacher who specialised in early childhood music education. She became my first mentor. Later, I joined a regional public music school and continued studying classical piano.

But I wanted more. After every family gig, I’d run to the piano and try to replay what I had just heard. This was the pre-internet era — no YouTube, no CDs, just vinyl, cassette tapes, and the radio. Learning songs meant waiting by the radio for hours with your finger on the record (& play button ;-) button, hoping the DJ would finally play that tune. That was our version of streaming. Vinyls? Sure, but my dad’s collection was sacred. You didn’t touch it unless you were given express permission... which was rare.

So I learned to play by ear. And I loved it.

As I got older, the world changed — or maybe I just did. Bands like Nirvana, Metallica, Oasis, and Rage Against The Machine exploded onto the scene. Suddenly, the piano didn’t seem Rock’n’Roll enough. I wanted distortion. I wanted solos. I wanted to be a rock star.

At a summer camp, where I initially played German Punk-Rock songs on the accordion, a girl showed me a few chords on her guitar. That was it. I was hooked. I didn’t have my own guitar, so I borrowed my uncle’s and started learning more chords.

Soon after, I formed a band with my brother Daniel and one of my best friends, Ziggy. We called ourselves The Apples. We didn’t have a bass player, but we didn’t care — we were rocking.

We started with covers, ranging from Punk Rock to Indie & Crunch and Heavy Metal. Then we began writing our own tunes. One of our songs ended up giving us a new name: Abartig. A few months later, we asked a friend in a bar if he wanted to play bass. Rene Perpeet joined.

Looking back, that time was magic. Every gig, every rehearsal — it was pure joy. Finding a place to practice was very difficult. I remember this rehearsal room which was a metal shed with a leaky roof. One winter, we arrived for a rehearsal and there was snow all over the drums.

In 1995, we recorded our first Punk Rock cassette (yes, cassette!) with five of our songs. A year later, we played a sold-out battle of the bands. We didn’t win — in fact, we came in dead last. But we brought the house down. The judges may have made up their minds early, but the crowd was on our side.

In 1997, our sound evolved again. We became Endless Sleep, leaning into a gothic melodic metal style. I started writing more on piano and guitar, and we brought in a keyboardist — my girlfriend at the time. She only played one gig with us, but the music kept evolving.

The original core — Daniel, Ziggy and me — remained. We needed new bandmates, and eventually reformed as Blue Spirit, with a whole new style and lineup.

When I was 17, my father died by suicide. Ziggy and I wrote a musical drama called A Voyage Through My History to honour his life. We performed it across our region, complete with stage, light & video show. Two years later, we recorded it as an album.

Blue Spirit carried on for over five years. We wrote. We toured. We poured everything into it.

But when I finished school, there was no money for music university. So in 1999, I started working in a bank and going to business college at the same time. For four long years, I did what I had to — not what I wanted to. Still, that experience gave me solid business skills I’d later use in managing bands, studios, and tours.

By 2003, I had saved enough to try again. I quit the bank and moved to Cologne to prepare for music college auditions.

I didn’t get in on the first try, but I kept going. I started my own company with my brother and worked as an audio engineer and event manager. All the while, I continued with Blue Spirit. Then in 2005, everything changed. My then girlfriend got offered a job in Dublin and asked me if I'd come along. I had nothing to lose, only her, so the decision was clear very quickly. She is the sunshine of my life, always was and always will be. Anyway, we moved to Dublin. Little did I know that this move would shift my entire path as a musician.

Ireland welcomed me in ways I couldn’t imagine. I quickly found work teaching, performing, and producing. I joined Japanese Toys in 2006 and opened Artlane Studios, where we recorded our single 'On My Stereo' and album 'Dance Me'. I also began playing with Portuguese singer Susana Lima, jazz vocalist Clare Dunne, and later co-formed the acoustic funk-rock duo Baumann & Casey with Steve Casey, and a trio, The CBB Three, with Abel Benito on drums.

In 2008, Abel introduced me to Newpark Music Centre, where he studied Jazz. I applied. This time, I got in.

My jazz studies began in 2009. One year later, I co-founded Tuscany Soundz recording studio with Andreas Nolan. In 2013, I graduated with a First Class Honours Bachelor of Arts in Jazz Performance.

As part of my final year, I formed the Mathias Baumann Group, a septet blending contemporary jazz with classical and still a touch of progressive rock. We recorded an album titled The World Is Coming Together. Around the same time, I recorded a more traditional Jazz album, Expectations, with the Mathias Baumann Quartet. In the coming years I continued to teach music in Clontarf School Of Music & Blanch Music, worked as a dep guitarist in a wedding band and performed many Jazz & corporate Soul & Funk gigs & in Ireland.

Through an artist bootcamp in Dublin, I met creatives from other disciplines in 2013. We felt an instant connection. That year, we formed an interdisciplinary art collective called idir and exhibited our works as 'Group Ego Trip 1' in New York at the New York Foundation for the Arts which was funded by Culture Ireland. After the project was finished I collaborated with Sinéad Cullen and Jo Cummins, two visual artists, on the Synesthesia-Art-Music project 'Raíces del Mundo - Nucleus - 4:09'.

Something clicked in me. I saw how powerful it could be to combine music with other art forms. Throughout 2014, I kept thinking:
"I’ve put so much into these albums. Why just release them the usual way?"

So I dreamed bigger:
What if it wasn’t just an album launch?
What if it was a full-blown show? With dancers, visual artists, filmmakers — a total sensory experience?

That’s when I realised:
This isn’t just about my music anymore. This is something much bigger.

I called different artists I had worked with over the years. We brainstormed. We imagined. Out of 'The World Is Coming Together', a new project was born which soon changed its name to Puzzle For Peace.

Well, life had a few more plot twists in store.

My wife and I bought a house — beautiful location, full of potential… and, of course, a leaky roof. What is it with me and leaky roofs? (Seriously!)
Anyway, we didn’t have the money to hire anyone, so we rolled up our sleeves and did all the work ourselves. Every floor board, every wall, every ceiling — we were in deep. Puzzle For Peace was on hold.

All the physical labour started to take its toll. I developed a muscle and nerve inflammation in my shoulder, and it became clear I had to step back from performing. That hurt — more than I cared to admit. But music never really leaves you. It just finds another way to show up again.

So, I shifted gears. I took on more teaching, expanded my days, and began developing a full syllabus for guitar, piano, music theory, and composition — tailored for music schools. It became a new kind of creativity — building musical foundations for others while trying to stay grounded myself.

Then came the rest of the house. More refurbishment, more doing it all ourselves. And just when things were starting to settle, COVID hit.

During lockdown, I fell playing football with my daughter — right on my already damaged shoulder. What began as an injury evolved into a full-blown frozen shoulder. To make matters worse, my body didn’t react well to the COVID vaccinations. Physically and emotionally, I spiraled. I found myself in a deep hole I didn’t know how to climb out of.

But I kept teaching. It became my lifeline. I started consulting with music schools on how to survive the pandemic — helping them adapt, digitise, and keep their communities together. Out of that, a new idea formed: I started my own business - Art Inspire Music - with the long-term vision of creating an app to support music schools and students. It gave me purpose, even if I wasn’t in the best place personally.

In September 2024, something shifted. A good friend, Lorcan Falls, asked if I’d play a pub cover gig with him. I hesitated — my shoulder still ached from time to time, but I said yes. Something told me I needed it.

That one gig changed everything.

We formed an acoustic duo, TerraSonic2, and started playing regular pub shows. And just like that, I felt a spark again. My shoulder had improved. My energy returned. I felt... alive.

Before my injury, I used to go on multi-day hiking trips through Ireland and the Alps. I’d always taken photos and video, capturing the beauty and stillness of those places. One day, I started looking through the old footage — and something inside me stirred. That’s when the inspiration hit: I created my 'Why Wall'. It was like watching a version of myself I’d almost forgotten. The Wall revealed one important answer I was searching for all that time:

I didn’t just want to play covers — I needed to write again. To express. To create something that was mine.

In March 2025 I started composing again, and a new piece of music was born: 'Panoramic Preview' — my first personal release in years. It went live in early June 2025.

And with it, everything changed again.