What's Your Gypsy Jazz Origin Story???

Bones

"Hope to keep learning until my hands stop working."

Ha, ha, roger that!

AmundLauritzen

My story is the classic cliche rock guitarist story, but it took an unexpected turn towards bebop jazz and eventually Djangos music.
I started playing guitar at 15 because I wanted to be one of the cool kids. I was the typical rock kid who liked metallica and wanted to play with tons of distortion, and eventually get all the ladies. That didn't really happen.
I didn't practice much. Didn't really start playing much until I was 18 or 19 years old and then I played the songs of Steve Vai and Joe Satriani - or I tried.
At 20 years old I got into bebop jazz after hearing Pat Martino. I was so hooked and wanted to learn that. Around that time when I was browsing the only record store in my city that had a decent selection of jazz, I stumbled across Hot Club Records. I knew nothing of Django music at that time, but I had heard the name "Jimmy Rosenberg" before, so I bought the album "Trio" which is with Nomy Rosenberg on rhythm guitar and Svein Aarbostad on bass. That was it! I absolutely loved the sound of the guitar and the way he played. He was so free and the ideas flowed. He had a fire in his playing that was so exciting! This also introduced me to The Rosenberg Trio which blew me away! When the Rosenberg Academy opened I started learning this music and haven't looked back since. I'd played bebop jazz for 3-4 years before that, but that is not getting so much priority now as it should. Most of my time goes to practice Djangos music from Stochelos lessons.

My story is not the typical one, mostly since I didn't discover Django first, but when I learned who Jimmy and Stochelo were inspired by when I was reading about them. I had heard the name Django Reinhardt before but never had an opportunity to hear the music because I was never around people who liked that music.
When I put on a record with Django and heard him play, tears filled my eyes. I do not normally react that way to music, but this just hit me in the heart so much. It was Django playing Minor Swing. To this day I think his version is superior. Everybody plays that tune so fast, but the way Django plays it is so elegant and melancholic. I wish more people played it at that slower tempo.

I practice gypsy jazz for 3-4 hours a day, some times more. This music has completely stolen my heart and the more I learn, the more I love it. I hope to go to Samois 2013 if I feel ready to jam then.

Jake Fisher

Well I was already a guitar player, and a real nerd for music when I met my fiancée who is an incredible Jazz violinist. She had mentioned Gypsy Jazz to me a couple of times but I never really looked into it. One day I found a movie on Netflix called "Life after Django Reinhardt" that was suggested to me after I watched a movie about Scott Joplin. I fell in love with the movie and with Gypsy Jazz. After that I got really into Django's music. Although when I first watched the movie I had no prospects of learning how to play in the gypsy style because it seemed way too hard haha. I just considered Django a genius and wanted to leave it at that. But after getting so heavy into gypsy jazz music I eventually learned a little bit of the style and have incorporated it into my playing a lot. I still don't consider myself a gypsy Jazz guitarist for the simple fact is I feel I could never be as good as the serious gypsy jazz players! haha

kevorkazito

I first heard about Django in 1983 and actually went out and bought some sheet music; I don't recall what the piece was. Like others, I didn't have the patience or the wherewithal to work that piece. Fast forward to November 2012, just a quiet night while on holidays I was perusing some music on youtube and I came across the Rosengberg Trio performing... I'm like WTF! (pardon my expression)... with my guitar for over 35 years I'm going "Goo Goo Gaa Gaa", and listing to Stochelo play was akin to Richard Burton reciting Shakespeare.

Followed by a few sleepless nights trying to imbibe all things Manouche, a couple of weeks later I have Denis Chang's DVDs, enrolled in RA, and am awaiting a couple of Michael's book. I'm doing this in a big way. Trying so hard to just practice Manouche a couple/few hours a day, maintain a day job and repertoire and chops for playing and recording with my friends and the odd studio session here and there. There's a lot on my plate but my focus is the Jazz Manouche. At the time of this writing I am not a kid anymore, but I have the benefits of discipline and patience. I feel like I am past the honeymoon (two hours of rest stroke practice today and trying to concentrate with every execution...) and am committed to my goal of being able to play this style.

And how wonderful it is to have all these resources (this forum especially). I am getting a great education here!

chip3174

Hi,

Well the first time I ever heard of Django Reinhardt was in a guitar magazine, probably in the late 80's. I remember thinking it was quite cool, and very exotic but at the time I was deep into SRV, blues and beginnings of Wes Montgomery jazz lines. It wasn't till a Christmas gift from my parents that I got to really hear his music. My initial thought was, "gee this is fun but kinda corny"...then I heard Django rip a chromatic scale and it flipped my head around. From then on, I realized there was much more to this enigmatic musician than I realized. Although it was his technique that initially really got me interested, it was the content that kept me coming back for more. In college I was studying almost entirely classical though I did play jazz in the combos and big bands. Flash forward about 10 years...I am a guitar teacher at a college and find myself returning to Django's music about once a year for two week stretches. For those two weeks, all i can do is play his tunes, try to play his licks. Minor Swing, the solo on Anniversary Song, and Dark Eyes. I'd play this eloquent music over and over because I loved it so much. Alas, I would realize at the end of two weeks, it really would almost mean I'd have to quit pretty much everything else in order to master the style. Then a colleague of mine, got the fever and bought a Gitane D-500 and it was all over. I tried that guitar and played some of the Django licks I had learnt and WHAMO! A D-500 was suddenly in my hands, I was buying the Horowitz books, the Chang dvds, the Wrembel methods and checking out as many online videos and lessons that I could find. I realized too, that I may never become a master of the style but I could learn things from it that can influence everything I play on the guitar. My chops on my electric guitar has definitely increased because of studying GJ. It made me rethink everything I thought I knew about guitar and it introduced me to whole new world of players...Stochelo, Bireli, Tchavalo, Matelo, Jimmy, Stephane...and though I may never be a true GJ master, I've gotten good enough to sit down and jam with great players and learn tunes that even non-musicians can get into. That is one of the great things about the style, it is so approachable and fun and yet a challenge for those of us that play it. I may never truly be great, but I will have a ball trying!! This is a great forum and it has proved very important in my study.
Here's to a great 2013 to all of you in the GJ community! Let's keep it all going!
Chip

Phil

chip3174 wrote:

...though I may never be a true GJ master, I've gotten good enough to sit down and jam with great players and learn tunes that even non-musicians can get into. That is one of the great things about the style, it is so approachable and fun and yet a challenge for those of us that play it. I may never truly be great, but I will have a ball trying!! ...Chip

Wonderful sentiments Chip, that hits the nail on the head for me about my love of GJ...cheers! Phil

Mitch

I was playing rock, metal...

A firend and I had a friend that began to take lessons with Jean Bonal. Bonal used to know Django so our friend learned Nuages, Minor Swing and we learned the chords. I listenend to Django but found it strange. Not good or bad, strange.

Then one or two years later I saw a Django cd in shop and bought it. Once home I put the cd on and was pissed off by the sound of the recordings and the price I had paid for it.
Then after two songs I was like "huh..." and by the end of the cd I thought "that guy is a genius, he played harmonics, sweeping, fast runs years before Van Halen and stuff". I was 17 and deep into rock.
Also, when I played the record for the second time I noticed I already memorized phrases or some short sequences because of Django's strong melodic power.
Songs were : Blues Clair, At the Jimmy's Bar, I can't give you (big band version), Daphné...

Then I started with a tab book on my classical but with the wrong technique of course.
When buying cigarettes in Lille i heard a kind of Django sound and rushed across the 'Grand Place'.
I saw Samson Reinhardt playing with his amp plugged on diesel power generator
IHe was kind and proposed to play with him on Daphné but I stopped at the birdge cause I didn't know it .
Samson was playing Django 1947 stimer style, incredible...
Then I bought the Bratsch 20th anniversary album with mindblowing performance of Angelo Debarre.

And when I bought my 3rd cd of Django with "Nuits de St Germain des Prés" I thought "that man is fucking genius to have played all these music from swing to bop".

And as a player the real kick was meeting shortly Stephane Wrembel in a park after having reading him on a web forum. He explained me the right hand technique.
Few months after I started Lessons with Serge Krief.

Et voilà !

Charles Meadows

I spent my younger years in heavy metal, then moved over to country "chicken picking" and newer bluegrass (Tony Rice etc). Bryan Sutton (one of my favorites) had a Dupont guitar and played minor swing on his album. He mentioned that Aubrey Haynie had turned him on to a group called the "Rosenberg Trio". I decied to investigate and bought Live in Samois. Completely hooked after hearing Stochelo's playing. I couldn't get enough Stochelo and was scouring youtube for clips, when I came across "There will never be another you" with Bireli and Angelo. Been a bigtime Debarre fan since then. Somehow I find Angelo (who uses his pinky more and plays some more linear lines than Stochelo) a little more of a fit for me.

Ando

I had a jazz radio show in college in 1988. One of the records that came through was John Jorgenson's After You've Gone on Curb Records. I played it, was knocked out, and searched for Django Reinhardt recordings. The vitality of it, the bounciness, the joy, is what got me.