Biréli Lagrène

Gipsy Jazz Straight From the Heart

Paris 

14/12/2001 - 

Biréli Lagrène, aka THE jazz guitarist of the decade, is renowned for his ability to play a wide range of styles. Indeed, Lagrène is equally at home playing be-bop, fusion, country and, of course, Gipsy jazz. Lagrène's latest album, Gipsy Project, finds this talented musician returning to the vibrant Gipsy guitar chords which echoed through his childhood.

When we arrived at legendary Paris jazz haunt, Le Petit Journal Montparnasse for Biréli Lagrène's concert, we found a highly unexpected audience assembled at the zinc comptoir. Scurrying across the room with a tray of drinks held high above his head, the waiter threw us a quick word of warning: "Don't worry if you get a seat near the bar ... There's a bunch of Gipsies up there. They might sound like hard men - but they're nice enough when you get to know them!"

The Gipsy contingent certainly made a striking contrast to the bar's habitual clientele. (Le Petit Journal normally caters to bourgeois couples with a penchant for candle-lit dinners and muted background jazz!) But as the evening went on it turned out that the colourful Gipsy crowd at the comptoir were actually a friendly bunch. What's more, their loud voices and exuberant laughter died down the moment they caught sight of Bireli on stage with his guitar! Meanwhile, over at the other end of the room, the French showbizz world was also well-represented. Thomas Dutronc, the son of Jacques Dutronc and Francoise Hardy, was comfortably installed in a ringside seat, chatting away to Mathieu Chedid (better known to French music fans as alternative popster "M"!)

Now, you may be thinking that it would take some pretty amazing guitar phenomenon to bring such a disparate audience together under one roof - and you'd be right! But when the guitar "phenomenon" in question finally appeared on stage you have to admit he wasn't exactly much to look at! Small, and distinctly plump-looking, with an anonymous-looking face, Biréli Lagrène had actually arrived at Le Petit Journal an hour earlier - not that anyone had noticed! Striding across the room, with his guitar slung across his back, Biréli paused to greet a friend and embrace Django Reinhardt's son (who, having recently lost his Gipsy 'guitar hero' father, had obviously come to console himself listening to the man who's been hailed as Django's heir!)

As Biréli made his way towards the stage, all eyes were riveted on his famous guitar which, with its cut-out centre and oval sound holes, is the instrument most typically associated with traditional Gipsy jazz. This is the style of guitar once used by the legendary "Hot Club de France" quintet (featuring Stephane Grappelli and Django Reinhardt), the one played by the famous family of Gipsy musicians, the Smala Ferret, and the instrument which has echoed through the world's most prestigious concert halls as well as across packs of Gipsy caravans parked in motorway lay-bys.
As Biréli took to the stage at Le Petit Journal an expectant hush descended on the room. Surrounded by an expert team of musicians - namely violinist Florin Niculescu, rhythm guitarists Holzmano Lagrène and Hono Winterstein and double bass player, Diego Imbert - Biréli was about to present a series of tracks from his latest album Gipsy Project. As jazz lovers in the audience were only too well aware, the line-up on stage was an exact copy of the legendary "Hot Club de France" who had graced the same stage some fifty years earlier. And everyone was eager to hear Biréli's brilliant cover versions of the Reinhardt classics, Belleville, Daphne and Swing 42.

"It's been a long while since I last played Django," Biréli joked, launching into his set, "But it gives me immense pleasure each time I do. I've moved away from this style of guitar-playing in the course of my career, but I must say it makes me enormously happy to come back to it now!"

In recent years Biréli's albums have tended to swing between modern fusions sounds or revisiting the jazz classics (c.f. his 1998 album Blue Eyes and his 1992 opus Standards). And, up until now, Biréli's backing band, Front Page, had shown no inclination to reinvent themselves as the "Hot Club". But, to be honest, Django and his legendary repertoire had always been hovering somewhere under Bireli's surface. In fact, you only have to listen to Biréli's 1995 album My Favourite Django or his debut opus, Routes to Django, to work that out for yourself!

Shortly after Biréli recorded his debut album - at the tender age of 14! - the jazz world began feting the "guitar Mozart". Legendary jazz violinist Stéphane Grappelli was one of the first to fall under Biréli's spell, inviting the young prodigy to play at a special birthday concert with him at the Carnegie Hall in New York in 1984. And shortly after that Biréli went on to work with the likes of Jaco Pastorius, John Mc Laughlin, Pat Metheny and Al Di Meola (to name but a few!) "I don't know whether I ever really was - or am - a phenomenon," says Biréli modestly, "All I can say is, my motivating force is music that comes from the heart, not the metronome or the triple quaver!"

Phenomenon or not, Biréli's concert at Le Petit Journal Montparnasse certainly brought the house down. Reviving Django's Gipsy jazz classics in style, Biréli soon had the audience eating out of his hand, whipping connoisseurs into a veritable frenzy with his intricate guitar intros. Women in the audience leapt up to dance to Blues clair, male jazz fans excitedly tapped their feet to Swing 42 and everyone present burst into rapturous applause during the opening bars of Belleville. With Florin Niculescu's violin floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee and the crowd going wild for Bireli's guitar solos, the concert at Le Petit Journal can only be described as a roaring success.

Let's face it, with an album like Gipsy Project and a jazz quintet as hot as Front Page, Biréli Lagrène looks set to confirm his status as a worthy successor to Django. And, frankly, who could possibly complain about that?

Frédéric  Garat