Elmar Stolley - Drums: Biography

Elmar was born in 1967 in Düsseldorf. At the young age of 10 he began taking lessons to learn the organ. In 1980 he began learning drums and 2 years later he started to learn the guitar as well but he quickly realised that his heart lie with drums.

In 1990 Elmar began taking private drum tuition with Andreas Gillman, firstly in Cologne for 2 years and then at the Drummers Institute in Düsseldorf. 4 years later Elmar decided to start a full time drum degree at the Drummers Institute. He graduated in 1995 with merit. During the degree he learnt various styles ranging from Pop, Brazil, Afro-Cuban, Big Band and Musical. In addition to this he learnt the areas of studio drumming, percussion, musical notation and harmony as well as taking part in advanced drum and percussion classes with such established names as Duduka da Fonseca, Kim Plainfield, Bobby Sanabria. Gene Jackson, Rene Cremers and John Riley.

Since 1995 Elmar has worked as a freelance musician and drummer in a diverse range of bands as well as working as a drum tutor.

With the project “sassy g.” Elmar performed at the Düsseldorf Schadowstrasse Festival and appeared on the festival CD “Schadow Beat” produced by the radio station Antenne Düsseldorf in 1997. The band also made the finals of the German Rock & Pop Award.

In 1999 Elmar started at the Yahama Musicschool in Düsseldorf as a tutor. During his time at the school Elmar was tutor and carer on behalf of the state for a child with Touretts and ADS.

From 1998 until 2002 Elmar was the drummer with the Düsseldorf Skiffle band “Heavy Gummi”. With concerts from Paris to Lisbon and as far away as Hong Kong Elmar gained valuable experience of professional touring. With “Heavy Gummi” Elamr won the Xanten music award.

With „KlangArt“ (percussion sound art) presented by Talkline the new Directory Enquiries in Berlin and TeamBeat (percussion theatre), Elmar performed in Dresden Airport. Elmar was part of the performance and experienced a whole new exciting world of drums and art.

During this time Elmar was involved in a wide range of studio jobs including productions by Scycs and Pia Lund. A drum sound perfectionist, Elmar’s attention to perfect tuning and drum sound lead to him working with many studios to tune drums.

In September 2006 Elmar was asked by Kris Pohlmann to substitute for regular dummer Daniel Häker in the Kris Pohlmann Band.

Since 2007 Elmar has drummed for „audiophile“(funk/rock), „Black Heat“ (New Orleans funk), „Element Fusion“ (acoustic/flamenco), „boogaloo” (funk/soul covers), „Iron Kid” (rock ‘n’ roll), „The Clou Experience” (top40), „Latin Sneakers” (Latin Jazz as back up drummer).

At the start of 2008 Elmar, having already helped out the band before, joined Kris Pohlmann Band as full time drummer.