Kristin Korb

Kristin Korb performs as a swinging bassist while also taking on occasional jazz vocal duties. She first concentrated on guitar and vocals within country music, counting Barbara Mandrell among her earliest inspirations, and additionally trained on piano and violin. One summer at the Soundsation Jazz Camp shifted her focus toward jazz performance; she then moved to electric bass in seventh grade to join a vocal jazz group and switched to acoustic bass in eleventh grade.

She received her Music Education degree from Eastern Montana College in 1992 and devoted the next two years to a master’s program in Classical Bass Performance at the University of California at San Diego, where Bertram Turetzky’s lessons encouraged her to sing and play bass simultaneously. In 1994 she met Ray Brown and began studying with him; he produced her debut album the following year, Introducing Kristin Korb with the Ray Brown Trio. That recording featured her vocals alone, whereas later releases on Grace Bass and Double K present her as both vocalist and bassist. She taught jazz history, bass, and the vocal jazz ensemble at Grossmont Community College from 1996 to 2000, then served as Director of Jazz Studies at Central Washington University from 2000 to 2002. After settling in Los Angeles in 2002 she has appeared at jazz parties, toured sporadically, and led her own trio.