PAUL VERNON CHESTER

Manouche Maestro
 

Stephane Grappelli - Interview 1973:

You know, in my opinion, the guitar and violin are the two best instruments together; they complement each other exactly. One of the greatest examples of this is the music of Joe Venuti and that marvellous guitarist Eddie Lang. Django Reinhardt certainly had heard these players on record, and when he learned that I was playing some jazz on the violin, he came to listen.
At that time jazz on the violin was such a novelty that I was constantly getting in to trouble with the management because customers complained that I was playing out of tune. But I stuck to it because I believed in what I was doing.
The two met at the Croix du Sud Montparnasse nightclub in early 1934 it is claimed?
Although I had never met Django, I seemed to remember him playing the banjo-guitar in the Bal-Musette. Anyway, one night in 1931, when I was playing in a club in Montparnasse, I saw this dark face staring at me very intently. I can tell you it made me nervous - I thought he was a gangster who didn't like my music. But it was Reinhardt of course. After some time he came over and asked me to play a jazz tune, and later we had sonic conversation about jazz and about Eddie Lang and Joe Venuti. Django was very enthusiastic about us playing together and so we arranged to meet.
I met him somewhere - I forget now and as he had his guitar with him we started to play to amuse ourselves. For myself I can say that we hit it together perfectly, and I was amazed that he could do the things he did with that injured left hand. And not only that, but he was the most marvellous improviser I had ever heard.
I didn't see Django again until we met in the same band in the Hotel Claridge two years later. During the break when another band came on to play tangos, our musicians used to go behind the stage, and as time went on Django and I used the break to do our own tunes. One day his brother was in the neighbourhood and he joined us with his guitar on rhythm.
Our great chance came when a friend of mine Pierre Nourry encouraged us to do a concert. He arranged the concert and invited two famous critics Charles Delaunay and Hughes Panassie. Django and I decided to add a bass and another rhythm guitar to the group, so we were now Django Reinhardt, Joseph Reinhardt, Roger Chaput, guitars, myself on violin, and Louis Vola, bass.
The concert was a fabulous success. Everybody went mad and Pierre Nourry was very pleased and excited. He persuaded a man who had just founded a recording company called Ultraphone to take a chance and record us. He agreed, but we had to do it for nothing. That was the first time I made a record with Django and also it was the first record of the Quintette du Hot Club de France.
In those days there weren't any tape recorders, they used to use sort of wax pancakes which were kept in the 'fridge, and if you made a mistake the record was ruined. So, we had four of these pancakes to make the record with and we played I Saw Stars. We missed nothing so we went on to do Lady Be Good, Tiger Rag and Dinah. We were amazed that we didn't make any mistakes in spite of the fact that Django was a bit late for the recording. The recording company was so impressed that we signed a contract for more recordings, and after a while everybody wanted to record us.
Despite his having to play mainly with just two fingers, Django didn't have any limitations; he could do anything. I was never nervous with him. I could go and play anywhere with him, because immediately he began to play, he put me in such ambience. You know when you have the jitters, sometimes your fingers refuse to work. It's inexplicable: it may only last a fraction of a second. I can't understand it myself, why now sometimes I'm nervous and sometimes I'm not. But with Django, I was never nervous. His first note was so fantastic, he put me in such a mood that I forgot the audience.
Django always played well and he never made a mistake, even when he was ill. I knew three men in my life who couldn't make a mistake; Django Reinhardt, Art Tatum, and that French pianist Martial Solal they're the kind of men who never made a mistake. You know, there are two sorts of mistakes. There is the mistake that comes from one's physical condition. Then there is the other called bad taste. Django never made the second type of mistake. He may make a mistake once a year, suppose his health wasn't good, or perhaps his guitar was out of order.
Django never looked after his guitar. He didn't care about it when he'd finished playing it; he'd just put it in a corner and it was his brother who would carry it around. Sometimes if there was nobody to carry it he would take it himself, but he never bothered to cover it. Oh, he used to play it when it was in a dreadful state sometimes; even broken and yet. Django was helped a lot by the nature of his physique. His wrist was double the size of mine, his fingers much longer; and he was terribly strong. I remember Django changed his guitars several times because after about six months the fingerboards used to have holes in them. That shows you the strength he had!  Yet in spite of being a strong man, Django was always suffering from something. Maybe it was his teeth, or his feet. And he must have suffered a lot with headaches, but he would never follow any advice about his health. Especially he wouldn't go near a doctor. Of course when he was ill, it would effect all of us. One day we might be recording and Django has toothache and if at that moment he feels the accompaniment is a bit out, or a bass note played accidentally wrong, he would be furious and he would correct the tempo in such a marked manner that I used to be afraid that a listener to the record would notice it. This in turn would make me nervous and then affect my playing also. Fortunately this didn't happen often.
Django was always concerned about the chord accompaniment. He just couldn't understand that anybody could make mistakes. Especially annoying to him was a wrong note in the bass. To him, a wrong bass note was an insult and he was often so rude to the bass player that they would leave, and so I was obliged many times to look for new bass players.  Once we got a new one who was a bit pretentious for our liking. Whenever Django asked if he knew such and such a tune, this bass player always said, 'Of course! What do you think, I've been playing for twenty years?' One day Django got fed up with this sort of thing and suddenly asked, 'Do you know Cherokee?' 'Of course!' came the answer. 'Well come on then', and off Django went at a terrific speed and in B major! That was Django. But sometimes we had some poor chap who was struggling to keep up, and Django would realise it and I would say, 'He's a bit nervous, don't take any notice.' And that man could play any old kind of bass and Django never said a word. You see, he was very temperamental, but inside he was a very kind man, and sometimes he didn't realise that he was upsetting people.

People often ask me if Django practised. Oh no, not Django; he was born with that technique. In my opinion we can compare him with that other phenomenon Paganini. By the music he left behind one can tell that Paganini must have been a fantastic player. I think Django was about the same degree a phenomenon. I remember one day he really let me down, I didn't know where he was and when he came back four months later, he assured me he hadn't touched the guitar - he'd lost it. That same night he played like a God. I had never heard anybody play the guitar like that; and after four months inactivity. I said, 'How can you do it? If I stop playing the violin for one week I can't play'. 'Oh, I don't know', he said. He never knew, it was always 'I don't know'. Anyway, he was so pleased to get back to his guitar and he was so amazed at his re-awakening that he didn't stop playing all that night. But of course his fingers were injured and they were bleeding. He'd go running up those very sharp strings so fast that he hurt himself, but he didn't take any notice. He used to play the guitar with the fingers sometimes, instead of the plectrum, and he liked the Spanish guitar. I remember us being invited to a party by a titled lady who used to delight in giving parties and inviting among her guests two people who were absolutely the opposite both in conception and tastes. This particular evening it was the turn of Andres Segovia and Django Reinhardt. So of course Django arrived three hours late, and without a guitar. Segovia was there, naturally at the right time and he'd played his repertoire. Everybody was upset because of Django and finally he arrived with a lovely smile, thinking it was okay. We said, 'Where have you been ? You're three hours late'. 'Oh, I didn't know'. Because Django never knows the time. He goes by the sun. 'Django, now it's your turn to play something'. But of course he had forgotten his guitar and Segovia doesn't want to lend him his, so someone has to rush off in a taxi to find some old box somewhere. And there you are; Django played solo guitar with a plectrum and then his fingers and he produced such a fantastic sound and improvisations that Segovia was amazed and asked, 'Where can I get that music?' Django laughed and replied 'Nowhere, I've just composed it!'

Django first heard an electric guitar in '46 or '47; I think it was at the Hackney Empire. Somebody brought in the guitar and it made a terrible noise - in those days electric guitars didn't sound as good as they do now. But Django was so impressed because at last he could play loudly. He played with such volume that I had to ask him to turn it down as it was drowning all of us. He was like a child with a new toy. Of course, to be fair, he didn't know how to handle it. We'd heard Charlie Christian, and although he would never play like Django, if you know what I mean - the electric guitar being easier than acoustic - Charlie Christian was a master of the electric guitar, Django was born to play acoustic guitar and the richness of Django was in his chords and he could never achieve the same dynamic effect that he could from his acoustic guitar. He never succeeded to play electric and in my opinion he never was a good electric guitarist.
I was in Florence when I heard about my old friend dying. And I didn't cry, like the man sitting in front of me at the time. It was too much of a shock for me, almost as if a great stone had fallen down on my head. I realised the meaning of it all a week later that I had lost my closest friend. But I must tell you and I've never told this to anybody. Django even dead is still with me, I am sure of that. It's not just that I feel his presence, but I feel that he protects me and inspires me to go on; because why, in my old age can I still not only play, but want to play more and more? The violin is never out of my hands and my fingers are as young as ever.

Playing with the Diz Disley trio is wonderful. Diz is the foremost player here who understands Reinhardt, and sometimes he produces that melodic line of Django's; not the same of course, because Diz has his own temperament too. Denny Wright also is a marvellous player, he's got such a good technique. Of course he can't produce Django's melodic line because Django invented it, but he has his own style, and on top of that he's got the strength of Django Reinhardt.
In my opinion he's the only player in the world who can compare to Django and, you know, when I'm playing with Denny Wright and if I let my spirit go, then maybe I find that for a few seconds I'm back again with Django Reinhardt.

On Django - "He did more for the guitar than any other man in jazz. His way of playing was unlike anyone else’s, and jazz is different because of him. There can be many other fine guitarists, but never can there be another Reinhardt. I am sure of that."

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Last modified: 25/04/2008