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Quintette du Hot Club de France

Quintette du Hot Club de France, often abbreviated to


QdHCdF or just QHCF, (The Quintet of the Hot
Club of France) was a jazz group founded in France in
1934 by guitarist Django Reinhardt and violinist Stphane
Grappelli, and active in one form or another until 1948.

ent group, featuring Hubert Rostaing as the rst of several clarinetists backed by a more conventional rhythm
section with drums, bass and a rhythm guitar played by
Djangos son Lousson Reinhardt, or his brother Joseph.
This version of the Quintette often featured six, not ve,
players, and was usually billed as Django et le Quintette
du Hot Club de France, or sometimes as Djangos Nouveau Quintette. Due to wartime shortages of material,
this version of the Quintette did not issue many recordings, although they did issue the rst recording of the
Django Reinhardt composition Nuages, later to become
a jazz standard.

One of the earliest and most signicant continental jazz


groups in Europe, the Quintette was described by critic
Thom Jurek[1] as one of the most original bands in
the history of recorded jazz. Their most famous lineup
featured Reinhardt, Grappelli, bassist Louis Vola, and
rhythm guitarists Roger Chaput and Joseph Reinhardt
(Djangos brother) who lled out the ensembles sound
In 1946, after the war, Grappelli and Django re-teamed
and added occasional percussive eects.
under the Quintette banner in an all-string format. As
before, they cycled through a number of rhythm guitarists and bassists. This last iteration of the Quintette
1 History
performed and recorded intermittently until about 1948.
There are several versions of how the band was formed.
The most generally accepted version amongst modern
jazz historians is that the group evolved from a series of
backstage jams led by Django Reinhardt, with Stephane
Grappelli. However, bassist Louis Vola said in an interview that he found the Reinhardt brothers playing on a
beach at Toulon.[2] He invited them to jam with his own
band.

2 References
[1] http://www.allmusic.com/album/r531911
[2] Delaunay, Charles (1961). Django Reinhardt. Da Capo
Press. pp. 4950. ISBN 0-306-80171-X.
[3] Delaunay, p66

After a series of informal jam sessions at the Hotel Claridge, concert promoters Pierre Nourry and Charles Delaunay (leaders of the Hot Club de France, a society chaired by Hugues Panassi devoted to the appreciation of jazz) urged the formation of a full-time group.[3]
With the addition of Reinhardts brother Joseph on second rhythm guitar, the quintet popularized the gypsy jazz
style. A series of European tours were very successful, with the group enjoying particular popularity in the
UK. Several bassists and rhythm guitarists rotated in and
out of the group, with Django and Grappelli remaining
the sole constants. In 1937, the American jazz singer
Adelaide Hall opened a nightclub in Montmartre along
with her husband Bert Hicks and called it 'La Grosse
Pomme.' She entertained there nightly and hired the
Quintette du Hot Club de France as one of the house
bands at the club.[4][5] As World War II broke out in
September 1939, the Quintette was on a concert tour of
England. Reinhardt, who spoke virtually no English, immediately returned to France, where he thought he would
feel safer than in the UK. Grappelli, meanwhile, stayed
in England.

[4] http://midniteinparis.tumblr.com/post/9935090286/
performer-adelaide-hall-and-her-husband-manager
[5] http://www.paulvernonchester.com/DjangoHaunts.htm

3 External links
National Geographics World Music site

Django continued using the Quintette name with a dier1

4 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

4.1

Text

Quintette du Hot Club de France Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintette_du_Hot_Club_de_France?oldid=671921803 Contributors: GTBacchus, Dave Cohoe, Lairor, AllyD, Superp, T. Anthony, Gabbkiss, SmackBot, John, Yeanold Viskersenn, Stualden, Kauczuk,
Fcgier, Ghmyrtle, Rothorpe, JimCubb, Engelbaet, Avicennasis, Cgingold, Mind meal, Toobaz, Hugo999, Technopat, JhsBot, Labalius,
Billinghurst, SalomonCeb, Cosprings, SieBot, Zijta, Protozoon, XLinkBot, Jan D. Berends, RichLow, Addbot, Luckas-bot, KamikazeBot,
Citation bot, LilHelpa, Xqbot, Motortown, New Zanzibor, ZroBot, Jazzista, CactusBot, KLBot2, BG19bot, Filing Flunky,
, Khazar2, Dunap, Handlebarr, KasparBot and Anonymous: 14

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Images

4.3

Content license

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