Pêche à la Mouche: The Great Blue Star Sessions 1947/1953

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Pêche à la Mouche: The Great Blue Star Sessions 1947/1953
Studio album by Django Reinhardt

Publication
(s)

1991

Label (s) Blue Star, Verve Records

Format (s)

CD

Genre (s)

swing

Title (number)

33

running time

91:48

occupation
  • Clarinet : Hubert Rostaing I / 3–16 & II / 1–9
  • Trumpet : Vincent Casino, Louis Mendardi, Jo Boyer I / 2

production

Eddie Barclay

Studio (s)

Studio Technisor (7/1947), Studio Lutetia (8/1947). Paris

Django Reinhardt performing at the New York jazz club Aquarium, around November 1946.
Photograph by William P. Gottlieb .

Pêche à la Mouche: The Great Blue Star Sessions 1947/1953 is a jazz album by Django Reinhardt . The double CD, released in 1991 by Verve Records , contains the material of seven sessions that the guitarist recorded with various line-ups between April 16, 1947 and March 10, 1953 for Eddie Barclay 's Blue Star label . The 1947 recordings were initially released as 78 recordings , the 1953 session as a 10-inch record.

History of the Blue Star recordings

The Blue Star sessions April – October 1947

After a disappointing USA tour with the Duke Ellington Orchestra in November 1946, Reinhardt initially tried to work as an arranger in the United States, which remained without results. At the turn of the year 1946/47 he still had a month-long engagement in the New York jazz club Café Society with Edmond Hall and Pete Johnson .

During his stay in the USA, Django Reinhardt heard the new bebop ; According to Arrigo Polillo , the swing guitarist was “equally overwhelmed and dismayed by him. ('It's the jazz of 1950', he said). Although he never admitted it, he had to feel that the new jazz had brought him into a crisis "

From then on his musical activities became more irregular; The most important feature of his stylistic change, however, was that from then on he only played electrically amplified guitar, although he initially had difficulties with the instrument and technology. In February 1947 he returned to Paris; in March he worked again with Stéphane Grappelli, who had returned from London, and performed with an ad hoc group. It includes his brother Joseph Reinhardt , the alto saxophonist Michel de Villers and the pianist Eddie Bernard .

On April 16, 1947 he took with this group for Blue Star on the title " Pêche à la Mouche "; On the same day, this formation, expanded by the house band of the Paris jazz club Bœuf sur le Toit, creates the title " Minor Blues ". The two numbers of this session were originally used as the soundtrack to a film by Marcel Carné . However, the strip with the working title La Fleur d'Age was not completed.

In early summer Reinhardt went on a tour of Belgium with his newly formed Quintette du Hot Club de France , where he recorded more titles. His band now included Joseph Reinhardt, clarinetist Hubert Rostaing , bassist Ladislas Czabanyck and drummer André Jourdan . Back in Paris on July 6, 1947, he recorded seven tracks, including his Grieg adaptation “ Danse Norvegienne ” and “ Folie à Amphion ”. The biographers Schmitz and Maier emphasize the character of the session through the sound of the electric guitar:
“ This brings Django's playing much closer to the sound ideal of the early American boppers, the guitarist imperative to sound like a horn . Equally characteristic of these new recordings is the shrinking of the importance of the rhythm section, the emphasis on drums and bass to cover the rhythmic-harmonic range, a distribution of tasks that was already common in America [at that time]. Incidentally, as is well known, Reinhardt himself often participates in the rhythm area to give Rostaing an even more colorful background. […] Nevertheless, the main event remains firmly in Django's hands, and Hubert Rostaing with his smooth, almost neutral tone fits very well into the ensemble's tonal concept; his improvisations show imagination and individuality with a dash of emotion, which is especially good for this music. "

The July session took place in the Technisonor studio , which was used by AFN for its broadcasts in Europe from 1944 to 1946 . Producer Eddie Barclay gave Reinhardt a free hand to record the pieces he liked without commercial restrictions.

After the recordings, he went on a tour of Germany with his quintet to play in army clubs in the military bases of the American occupation zone , in Heidelberg, Mannheim, Bad Nauheim and in Frankfurt am Main. After his return, Reinhardt recorded seven tracks on July 18, 1947, in addition to his own compositions, the standards “ I'll Never Smile Again ”, Ary Barroso's classic “ Aquarela do Brasil ”, here called “Brazil” for short, and Kurt Weill's “ September Song ” . Although Reinhardt dominates these recordings, there are considerable solos by clarinetist Rostaing to be heard.

In August Reinhardt changed his band; added bassist Emmanuel Soudieux . After recordings as a sextet for Delaunay's label Swing at the end of August 1947, which were published under the title Souvenirs de Django Reinhardt , he took up again on October 4, 1947 for Eddie Barclay; During the session led by Hugues Panassié , the guitarist created his own compositions such as “ Moppin 'the Bride ”, “ Mano ” and “ Gypsy with a Song ”, but also Eddie Durham's standard “ Topsy ”, the jazz hit by the pioneer of the electrically amplified guitar , with clear bop elements.

Rex Stewart with the Duke Ellington Orchestra (1943)

After further recordings for Swing in November (" Artillerie Lourde ", " Belleville ") he recorded two titles for Barclay with cornetist Rex Stewart and his quintet, Cole Porter's classics " Night and Day " and " Confessin ' ".

The 1953 Blue Star session

After a phase of retreat at the beginning of the 1950s, when Reinhardt could not find his way around the new musical developments in post-war France (and preferred to spend the time fishing and playing billiards), he started working again at the Club Saint-Germain-des- Prés with the avant-garde of the French jazz scene at the time, such as Hubert Fol , his brother Raymond Fol , Fats Sadi and Roger Guérin . Finally Eddie Barclay was able to persuade him in 1953 to come to the studio for new recordings. Behind it was the producer Norman Granz , who hoped to get Reinhardt to tour the USA again. With the pianist Maurice Vander , Pierre Michelot and Jean-Louis Viale , he recorded eight tracks on March 10, 1953 under the title Django Reinhardt et Ses Rhythmes ; a new version of his composition " Nuages " (which the participating bassist Pierre Michelot considered the best the guitarist ever recorded), again Barroso's " Brazil ", the " Blues for Ike ", accompanied only by Michelot's bass, and again Porter's " Night and Day "and" Confessin ' ". It was the penultimate recording session of the legendary guitarist who died on May 16, at the age of only 44 in Samois-sur-Seine .

Rating of the album

Richard Cook and Brian Morton include Pêche à la Mouche: The Great Blue Star Sessions 1947/1953 (in addition to the Swing / Vogue recordings from this period such as " Swing de Paris " and the 1949 Rome session with Stéphane Grappelli) among the best albums in Django Reinhardt's late work and rated it with the second highest grade. They particularly emphasize the spontaneity and informality of the Barclay sessions; a highlight for the authors is the elegant " Night and Day ", which was created at the Rex Stewart session in December 1947, and the amazing 53 version of " Brazil " with a fiery grace, as well as beautiful versions of " Manoir de Mes Rêves " and " Nuages ".

Also Digby Fairweather stands in jazz - Rough Guide the album as one of the most important in the discography of the guitarist produced; Reinhardt developed his playing on the electric guitar to a mastery; the album contains "fascinating music from the last months of Django's life". In 1992 it was awarded the Prix ​​Fats Waller as the best re-release of the year.

The titles

Archtop guitar Epiphone Zephyr; Django played the 1946 model.
  • Django Reinhardt: Pêche à la Mouche: The Great Blue Star Sessions 1947/1953 (Verve 835418-2)

CD 1

  1. Pêche à la Mouche (Reinhardt) 2:33 (April 16, 1947)
  2. Minor Blues (Reinhardt) 2:45
  3. For Sentimental Reasons (W. Best / D. Watson) 2:56 (July 6, 1947)
  4. Danse Norvegienne (Grieg / arr.Reinhardt) 3:00
  5. Blues for Barclay (Barclay) 2:52
  6. Slide à Amphion (Reinhardt) 2:52
  7. Vette (Reinhardt) 3:12
  8. Anniversary Song (R. Ivanovici / S. Chaplin / A. Jolson) 3:34
  9. Swing 48 (Reinhardt) 2:44
  10. September Song ( Kurt Weill / M. Anderson) 3:17 (July 18, 1947)
  11. Brazil ( Ary Barroso ) 2:45
  12. I'll Never Smile Again (Ruth Lowe) 2:39
  13. New York City (E. Barclay) 2:35
  14. Django's Blues (Reinhardt) 3:04
  15. Love's Mood (E. Barclay) 3:05
  16. I Love You (H. Thompson / H. Archer) 2:51

CD 2

  1. Topsy ( Eddie Durham ) 3:03 (October 4, 1947)
  2. Moppin 'the Bride - Mucro - (Reinhardt) 2:19
  3. Insensitivity (P. Misraki) 3.11
  4. Mano (Reinhardt) 2:52
  5. Blues Primitif (E. Barclay) 2:41
  6. Gypsy with a Song - take 1 (Reinhardt) 3:00
  7. Gypsy with a Song - take 2 (Reinhardt) 2:56
  8. Night and Day ( Cole Porter ) 2:52 (December 10, 1947)
  9. Confessin '(That I LoveYou) (AJ Nelborg / D. Dougherty / E. Reynolds) 2:55
  10. Blues for Ike (Reinhardt) 3:21 (March 10, 1953)
  11. September Song (Kurt Weill / M. Anderson) 2:33
  12. Night and Day (Porter) 2:50
  13. Insensitivity (P. Misraki) 3:06
  14. Manoir de Mes Rêves (Reinhardt) 2:35
  15. Nuages ​​(Reinhardt) 3:15
  16. Brazil (A. Baroso) 2:35
  17. Confessin '(That I LoveYou) (AJ Nelburg / D. Dougherty / E. Reynolds) 3:37

Editorial note

The recordings of the sessions from July to December 1947 appeared in France as 78 records on Blue Star; in the USA they were marketed by Dial Records as a 10-inch LP (DIAL 218 and 214). The sessions from July to October 47 with Rostaing and Rex Stewart are now also available on CD as Django's Blues on Emarcy Records.
While the recordings from 1947 were initially only released as 78 records, the eight tracks from the March 1953 session under the title Django Reinhardt et Ses Rhythmes were published simultaneously by Blue Star (BS 6830 and BLP 6830) in France and by Norman Granz ' label Clef (MGC 516) in the United States as a 10-inch LP.

literature

Memorial plaque for Django Reinhardt in Samois-sur-Seine

Web links

Commons : Django Reinhardt  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Polillo reports that Django - overestimating his popularity in the USA - traveled without luggage and without a guitar, in the hope that the guitar makers there would give him an instrument. Since the organizers of the concert tour were informed in advance of his chronic unpunctuality, they did not announce him as a precaution in the concert program, which disappointed him very much. At the second concert in New York's Carnegie Hall on November 24, 1946, he did not come until eleven o'clock, which led to negative reviews. In addition, the jazz press said Django has not yet got used to the electrically amplified guitar he has recently been using. See Polillo, p. 458.
  2. ↑ Quoted from Polillo, p. 458.
  3. ^ French for fly fishing
  4. ↑ Quoted from Schmitz / Maier, p. 194.
  5. ↑ Quoted from Rostaing, liner notes.
  6. ↑ Alexander Schmitz / Peter Maier, p. 195.
  7. ↑ See Schmitz / Maier, p. 29 f.
  8. ↑ See Michelot, Liner Notes.
  9. ↑ Schmitz / Maier, p. 214 f.
  10. ↑ His last session for Vogue took place on April 8, 1953 with Martial Solal , Pierre Michelot, Fats Sadi and Pierre Lemarchand , where " Deccaphonie " and " I Cover the Waterfront " were created.
  11. ^ Cook & Morton, p. 1296.
  12. ^ Fairweather, p. 290.