Kailin Yong

kungfumonk007

So for one brilliant year I had the blessing of having Kailin in my group before he moved back to Singapore. I am so convinced that he deserves to be one of the biggest names as a fiddler. I get to play with a ton of top players, worked with Tim Kliphuis for Djangofest Denver last summer, and I am wholly convinced that Kailin is one of the best most original and definitely the most fluid players out there. He isn't by any means a Gypsy Jazz player, he just plays notes with the most seamless blending of his personality possible. My wife says "To know Kailin's playing is to know Kailin." I hope I can make fans of all of you and we can get him playing in the Gypsy Swing festivals as he is as brilliant as any musician I've worked with. Check out some of his albums, they are amazing.
http://kailinyong.com/

Unfortunately not a lot of good videos of him playing but here are a few:

Gypsy Swing with Joscho:


Non-gypsy jazz

John418

Not a GJ player? Perhaps, Aaron, but here's Kailin Yong with some of the sickest violin ever recorded in this genre. Beautiful, unique phrasing. Yeah, Kailin needs to get to Django in June and DFNW.

dennis

nice! definitely unique. Sounds like he had a solid classical training, but he doesn't let it get in the way of playing other styles. A lot of classical players have an exaggerated classical vibrato and exaggerated since of rhythm when playing jazz. He's doing some really complex techniques (to play in tune) in those vids.

kungfumonk007

I believe he was concert master of Vienna conservatory, but then ran away to the states to become a homeless street musician in San Fran, where he broke his classical training and became a crazy out of the box fiddler, eventually ending up in Boulder where he fit in perfectly. He has all the qualities you see in a world class player. He hears a tune once and he knows it, owns it, and improves it. Him, Laura (the vocalist in the videos) myself and Mike Fitzmaurice clicked as a quartet really well, and just need one more person to join us for a west coast tour. Any takers, or suggestions? Someone who is up for some out of the box GJ. I wish I had a good video of Mike improvising gypsy jazz, but you'll have to take my word for it - it is completely SICK, his bowing technique is just out of this world and you'll have to believe me it is something unique and magical. I wouldn't trade my bass player for Swing Je T'aime but this quartet just worked perfectly, just need to make it a quintet and find enough shows to justify flying Kailin out from Singapore.