Interesting Django Recordings and Lost Footage?

Svanis1337

Before we get to the subject;

According to Spatzo there is 8mm footage of Django in 1946 just hours before his Carnegie Hall concert, speaking to a frenchman in a local bar.

Django appeared in a 45+ minute BBC TV Broadcast in 1948 with Stéphane Grappelli and their english quintet.

Django appears in the 1937 film "Naples Kissed by fire" (Naples au baiser du feu).

When I'm old enough, I'm going on a tour to find that footage. I encourage you all to search, if you're true fans of Django.

I'll be speaking with Django directly and making intimate recordings with him as soon as I get a hold of a working time machine.

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I mastered the tracks before uploading them.

It is said that Django never played the electric guitar in company of Stéphane Grappelli.

In the 1948 recording of "Odette" (Intégrale Volume 6) it sounds like Django is playing an electric guitar. The violinist sounds a lot like Stéphane Grappelli. Judge for yourselves.



The 1945 recording of "Sweet Sue" includes an insane solo by Les Lieber on Penny-Whistle! (Irish Tin Flute)



The 1949 Radio Broadcast of "Night and Day" with Paul Baron is the very last recording of Django on Acoustic Guitar. (not counting his 1950 Belleville and Nuages improvisations) And this isn't even on his usual Selmer. It's some other guitar.



Lastly: How about 1953 "Nuages"?



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I was browsing the internet when I found an image of Django and Harry Volpe. They thought it was Joseph Reinhardt! We all know how much alike they look. Also, on another site, they believed Joseph to be Django. :roll:

Teddy Dupont

Spatzo and I have been looking for "new" Django film footage for years without success but we will continue to do so. We have also been working on a time machine to get back to see and talk to him, again without success.

On "Odette" the guitarist is Joseph Reinhardt not Django. You can hear Django playing an electric Rio guitar with Stephane at the first Nice Jazz Festival on Fremeaux Integrale Vol 16, "Swing 42" & "Nuages". These are the only known recordings of Django playing an amplified/electric guitar with Steph. Here is a well known photo of that concert:-

Teddy Dupont

Svanis1337 wrote:

According to Spatzo there is 8mm footage of Django in 1946 just hours before his Carnegie Hall concert, speaking to a frenchman in a local bar.

If that is the film I think it is, we found it but it wasn't Django, it was Edith Piaf's accordion player with Marcel Cerdan. Quelle bummer! :roll:

rimm

THANK U SO MUCH FOR THE RECORDINGS!
I HAVE to get the whole Integrale set, I keep on hearing things I have never heard before. Long may it last. I have visions of a warehouse full of old acetates and super 8's of Django like at the end of Raiders of the lost ark...there HAS to be some more. 8)

Svanis1337

Thank you for that piece of information, doc. I had forgotten. That photo is one of the ridiculously good quality ones, and here is the best quality one I have as proof:

Click the photo to see it in high resolution, as always with attachments.


Other sources claim that photo was the last one taken of Django alive in Switzerland in 1953. And that this photo was taken at the same time, with Django on an archtop Gibson with an Epiphone amplifier.



Argh! So close on the 8mm. Shame.

Odette was Joseph? Jawsus. Seems like Daniel Nevers is never right.

I thought you already had a time machine, Teddy? :P



As for the recordings, I have the exact same vision. I've also had dreams about meeting Roger Baxter and speaking to him about the photo of Coleridge Goode's daughter sitting on Django's lap et.c. And speaking to him about plectru-... Plectra. I also dreamt of meeting Django once. What an experience! Thank you for your appreciation rimm.

The recording of Choti, which may or may not be Django was suspended until the mid-90's and Nuages take 1 from 1940 was unheard for 40 years. Now if we could only find the second version of Nuages with Grappelli and Reinhardt in Rome from 1949...

The Intégrale series is the only TRUE complete collection of Django...

"Troublant Boléro"

Intégrale Volume 16 disc 2 opens with 8 live recordings of Django in 1948 including the first ever recording of "Troublant Boléro". (Called "Boléro" here). It starts with a rather amusing UHH! From an unknown musician. He recorded "Troublant Boléro" a few other times, in 1949, in 1950, two times in 1951 and once in 1952.

Intégrale Volume 19 disc 2 includes version 2 of the 1951 "Troublant Boléro" which is a radio broadcast, thus, for some reason, it's much higher quality than version 1 which was a studio recording. Here is version 2:


Late Django on electric guitar with his beautiful tone and a complete symphony orchestra on a beautiful, haunting tune in high quality; broadcasted in France on radio, Django clearly ruled the whole of Radio for a brief moment. All the sceptics and critics would've hung their heads in shame as our hero proves again his powers of touching his listeners' hearts with two fingers. A masterpiece. And his very own composition. No other soloists. Perfect execution.

This is why we see him as something more than a human at times.

Teddy Dupont

Svanis1337 wrote:

Other sources claim that photo was the last one taken of Django alive in Switzerland in 1953. And that this photo was taken at the same time, with Django on an archtop Gibson with an Epiphone amplifier.

This Switzerland claim was my mistake from many years ago based on the fact that Django looked very old in that particular shot and I knew Challain Ferret was in Switzerland in 1953 which, of course, Django visited just before he died. I have since obtained a photo showing the whole group on stage at the Nice Opera House proving it was the 1948 Nice Jazz Festival. The other one of Django with the borrowed Gibson and Challain Ferret in the background was definitely taken in Nice at the same time during some jam or other.

It claimed for many years that this Gibson was the one Django played in America but that is clearly not the case.

I truly believe there is some more Django film footage out there somewhere but whether we can find it before it is destroyed is less certain. Who would have thought a few years ago that we would actually see Django playing in the 1932 "Clair de Lune" movie which we had been told was never completed and subsequently lost?

Sadly the film "Rivages de Paris" for which Django recorded the solo versions of "Belleville" and "Nuages" only has him on the soundtrack.

Teddy Dupont

Svanis1337 wrote:

This is why we see him as something more than a human at times.

Musically, he was more than human. 8)

spatzo

Hi!

I agree that on the dreamy "Rivage de Paris" the missing soundtrack of the whole reel nr.1 including Django playing part of his Mass on his guitar will be a great founding...

There is a small footage of Django walking in "la zone" near his roulotte round 1929 some monthes after his fire accident...

There might be a soundless footage of Django, Joseph and a mandolinist player (Balon?) playing in Toulon's harbour in 1931 for the inauguration of a monument. Unfortunately the reel couldn't be found (probably mislabelled as what I have seen was nothing else than a ridiculous women catch encounter on a boat in the middle of a river)...

There might be also a footage of Louis Vola's orchestra (including Django, Grappelli, Chaput) playing in 1934 at the Claridge Hotel Tea Afternoons in Paris... Unfortunately the reel is still missing or was mislabelled...

I have been also told by a well informed and very famous guitarist that there is for sure a reel - somewhere - of Django playing "Swing 42"...

A Wales-born BBC TV technician might also have kept for him a couple of reels captured during the famous program "Stars in their Eyes" in 1948...

We do know that two tunes are still missing from the "J'attendrai" advertising documentary "Jazz Hot"...

There is also for sure an 8mm soundless footage with Harry Volpe and Django Reinhardt eating spaghetti and playing at Harry's home... - the film has been seen many many years ago by guitarist Fred Sharp and Fred told me what he remembered and also told me he had returned the reel to Harry Volpe in Florida without making any copy of it. (Stevie Cochran is the good-but-hard-to-meet contact to find that)

There was an interview made by a US radio (WKEW AM) during Django's tour with Ellington but unfortunately when the radio converted from AM to FM they burned all the acetates they had kept during the years...

Everything is possible after the Diamand-Berger "Clair de Lune" appearance after some 70 years

Best

Svanis1337

That interview you speak about reminds me of the 1947 "Rendez-vous In Paris" Radio Programme
with Eddie Barnard on piano and "Django" speaking english. They call "Minor Swing" "No-Name Blues" for some reason.




I have no idea what's wrong with this one. Major dropouts throughout.


You and Roger are amazing. When I hear Django and destroyed in the same sentence, it's like a knife of melancholy through my heart. Shame on that interview. I'm certain you and Roger will find something. Some footage is probably with some sort of collector who doesn't have a clue who Django is. Like the place the Jazz Hot footage ended up. In a box full of other old footage. How in the world did that end up there, and was it the original or just a copy?


There's just one video from Django, with a song called "J'attendrai" - Joscho Stephan

Prove him wrong, lads!.. But you already did.

Svanis1337

I have a question. Isn't Django playing electric with Grappelli in 1947 on "Oui, Pour Vous Revoir"? (Intégrale 15 disc 2)

spatzo

Of course it isn't Django nor Grappelli