Berger was born on March 30, 1935 in Heidelberg, Germany. He began his piano studies at the age of 10, but at the age of 14 heard his jazz jams and decided to play his own music. In 1953 he joined a group that included Mr. Serzo, whom he would soon marry. She survived him with his daughter Sabia.
As a house pianist at Heidelberg’s Cave 54 club in the 1950s, Mr. Berger learned modern jazz in late-night jam sessions with American musicians from the military band stationed nearby. He got his Ph.D. He received his doctorate in musicology and philosophy in Germany in 1963, where he held professorships in philosophy at two universities. By the mid-1960s, however, he turned to music.
He moved to Paris and joined a group led by trumpeter Don Cherry, who had learned world music melodies from shortwave radio broadcasts. In 1966, Mr. Cherry invited Mr. Berger to New York City to perform. “Symphony for Improvisers” A groundbreaking free jazz album.
Berger produced his debut album as a leader, From Now On, in 1967, and recorded with Cherry and others in the late 1960s. He has made over 20 of his albums as a leader and many as a sideman. Repeatedly playing his lean, linear and freely melodic vibraphone, he became the top vibraphonist in Down Beat magazine’s poll of musicians.
In 1971, Mr. Berger launched the Creative Music Foundation with Mr. Serzo, Mr. Coleman and an advisory board that included John Cage, Gil Evans, Buckminster Fuller and Willem de Kooning. He moved to Woodstock in his 1972 to open a creative music studio. The studio settled in a nearby mountain cabin with a residence and performance space.
Leading musicians such as Braxton, DeJohnette, Cecil Taylor and Dave Holland joined the improv group. Over 550 performances were recorded and digitized for archives purchased by Columbia University Libraries in 2012.
