Roger Cicero Biography

Roger Marcel Cicero Cziczeo (born July 6, 1970 in Berlin) is a German jazz musician and the son of the Romanian pianist Eugen Cicero.

He made his first appearance at the age of eleven supporting German singer Helen Vita. He appeared on television for the first time aged 16, alongside the RIAS-Tanzorchester, then under the direction of Horst Jankowski. Cicero joined the Hohner Conservatory in Trossingen when he was 18, where he received coaching in piano, guitar and singing. Between 1989 and 1992, he appeared alongside the Horst Jankowski Trio, the Eugen Cicero Trio (his father’s group) as well as with the Bundesjugendjazzorchester (German Youth Jazz Orchestra), which was then directed by Peter Herbolzheimer. From 1991 to 1996 he studied jazz singing at the Amsterdam Academy of Arts (Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten) at Hilversum. Since then, he has been a guest singer with the groups Jazzkantine and Soulounge with whom he took part in the Montreux Jazz Festival. In 2003 he founded the Roger Cicero Quartet, as well as continuing to perform with his eleven-piece big band. His style is predominantly that of 1940s and 1950s swing music, combined with German lyrics.
In 2006, Cicero was involved with the album Good Morning Midnight by jazz pianist Julia Hülsmann, and released his first solo album Männersachen in May of the same year. Working alongside thirteen composers (predominantly Matthias Haß and Frank Ramond), his music has an unusual composition. "Schieß mich doch zum Mond" is the German version of Frank Sinatra’s classic "Fly Me to the Moon". The covered track "Zieh die Schuh aus" ("Take your shoes off"), which deals ironically with the battle of the sexes, reached number 71 in the German singles chart. The album Männersachen made it to number 3.

Cicero was Germany's participant for the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 in Helsinki but finished only 19th in the rankings. With his song Frauen regier'n die Welt (Women rule the world) he won the preliminary decision in a competition against Monrose and Heinz Rudolf Kunze. Although he won with Frauen regier'n die Welt it peaked at number 7 in the hit parade; it stayed in the Top 10 for one week and dropped out of the Top 30 after four weeks.

On 7 July 2007 he performed at the German leg of Live Earth in Hamburg. On May 1, 2008 he became father to a son, Louis.

Cicero made his film debut in "Hilde" (2009) and received good notices for his performance as musician Ricci Blum. Directed by Kai Wessel, the film is a biography of the German singer and actress Hildegard Knef, who is played by Heike Makatsch. He appeared as the singing and speaking voice of Prince Naveen in "Küss den Frosch", the German dubbed version of The Princess and the Frog.

His third studio album, "Artgerecht", was released on April 3, 2009. On March 20, 2009 the first single from the album, "Nicht Artgerecht", was released.

He was one of the participating artists at the concert in honor of the Dalai Lama in August 2009 in Frankfurt.

Roger died on 24th March 2016 leaving behind a son who was born in 2008. His management asked fans to make donations to the charity Save The Children which Cicero supported.