Born in 1984 in Ukraine, Dima Bondarev began playing the trumpet at the age of 9. He discovered his passion for Jazz after initially studying classical music as a child. Between 2008 and 2013, Dima was very active in his homeland taking part in major Jazz festivals and concert tours. He was a member of the famous Ukrainian Jazz bands Acoustic Quartet and Magnifika group. 

In 2011 and 2016, he was awarded the Polish Cultural Scholarship “Gaude Polonia” and took lessons in Warsaw and Wroclaw with Piotr Wojtasik and Robert Majewski. 

Since 2013 Dima has been based in Berlin where he undertook both Bachelor and Master studies at the Jazz Institut Berlin (JIB) with Gerard Presencer, Tom Arthurs and Sebastian Studnitzky, as well as John Hollenbeck, Greg Cohen, Geoffrey De Masure, Julia Hulsmann, Tino Derado, Guilherme Castro and Javier Reyes. During his studying Dima was awarded with JIB-Jazz-Preis der Karl Hofer Gesellschaft (2015) and Deutschlandstipendium (2017). Shortly after his graduation as a Master of composition in 2020 Dima was granted the scholarship Elsa-Neumann Stipendium.

 

In 2021 he got a year Scholarship program from Jazzcampus Basel (CH) called Focusyear, where Dima improved his knowledge under his mentor Ambrose Akinmusire, and regularly performed with well-known jazz artists.

 

Along his professional carriere Dima has collaborated with Aaron Parks, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Larry Grenadier, Logan Richardson, Coung Vu, Kris Davis, Lionel Loueke, Jorge Rossy, Wolfgang Muthspiel, Elena Pinderhughes, Greg Cohen, Doug Weiss, Joey Baron, Conrad Herwig, Steve Turre, Nels Cline, Jim Black, NDR Big Band, Brussel Jazz Orchestra, Guillermo Klein, Josh Ginsburg, Wanja Slavin, Elias Stemeseder, Ingrid Laubrock, and many others. All while developing his own band, and recording his debut album I’m Wondering (Unit Records, 2017)

 

Both as a sideman and a band leader Dima took part in a number of major jazz festivals such as North Sea Jazz Festival (Nederland), Umbria Jazz Festival (Italy), Xjazz Festival, Berlin Jazz Fest (Germany), Jazz and Odra (Poland), Jazz Bez, Leopolis Jazz Fest (Ukraine) and Jazz à Montauban (France) and others.