PAUL
VERNON CHESTER
Manouche Maestro
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Manouche Maestro |
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Roger Chaput - Guitarist and Artist
Around 1925, he began playing in the "Ca Gaze" bal musette with Michel Peguri the accordionist and it was here he claims to have first met Django Reinhardt whom he described as "a little street urchin". Musicians are inherently creative, and many engage in other forms of creation as a means of exercising these impulses. When they are not in the studio or on stage many musicians through out time have devoted themselves to writing poetry and prose and some have even turned to the visual arts to express their unique artistic voice.
It often seems that artists aspire to be music stars
and music stars aspire to be artists but only some of these musical geniuses
have successfully bridged the gap between the two forms and have been successful
in both arenas. Musicians such as Miles Davis have found a second front of fame
through the visual arts, a stunning achievement and a tribute to their talent.
Roger Chaput - sat in on a between sets jam at the Claridge Hotel in Paris with Django, Steph and Loius Vola and the Quintet was born. In the early days, he enjoyed the exhilaration of being part of a band that was creating a whole new musical genre but as the years passed, he gradually began extricating himself from an arrangement that he felt to be financially unacceptable. Both Reinhardt and Grappelli were notorious for being extremely mean with their sideman. The last occasion Roger Chaput recorded with the Hot Club Quintet was in January 1938 during the groups first visit to the UK. By the time they returned to tour later in the year, he had left
Joseph Reinhardt, a mature Roger Chaput and Henri Crolla
Goode's description of Django upon their first meeting--looking a bit dishevelled and wearing big boots more suited for mountain climbing
This above painting shows off many of the key characteristics of Chaput’s work. Painted in a naive and two-dimensional style, the painting of a needle worker is nonetheless infused with a deep sense of energy. Derived from the almost uncontrollable tone of red that fills the background, the energy seems to be everywhere but on the face of the subject. Oblivious to the enlivened atmosphere the worker plugs away at her chore, her thoughts lost even to herself. Much of Chaput’s portraiture features profile views of subjects that seem almost overwhelmed by their backdrop, perhaps his way of expressing an atmospheric rhythm he discovered in interwar Paris.
Pierre Fouad - Drums, Marice Speileux - Piano, Charles Hary -Saxophone Decca Studio London Portrait
1942 Poster - Below - Eddie
Barclay, (Edouard Ruault) French jazz pianist, popular music promoter and Swing
Record Producer |
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Roger Chaput is unique in that he was not only the
first Quintette du Hot Club de France rhythm guitarist but also the only
non-gypsy guitarist to have played regularly with the group. He was born in May,
1909 in Montluçon, Allier but the following year his family moved to
Menilmontant and he considered himself a Parisien. By the time he was 10 years old, he was taking
guitar and mandolin lessons from an Italian called "Papa Jean" and roaming the
Bastille district listening to the accordion players. 
These multi-talented artists are not confined to the boundaries of jazz music as
is proven by the interesting career of Chaput. Born in 1909, Chaput and his
parents moved to Paris while he was young and the budding musician soon came to
identify the city as his own. Learning the guitar as a child, Chaput eventually
found his calling playing the jazz and swing music of the day. His most
successful venture into the Parisian music scene came when he joined Django
Reinhardt, Reinhardt’s brother and even a jazz violinist to form the
Quintette
du Hot Club de France. This group, active in the 1930’s, was inspired by
American jazz and swing music but borrowed heavily from the gypsy guitar roots
of Reinhardt’s childhood. Playing rhythm guitar for Reinhardt for nearly a
decade, Chaput eventually shifted gears towards the visual arts, creating
caricatures and eventually moving on to oil paints. Capturing still lives,
portraits and landscape pieces, the artist funnelled his vibrant artistic
bravado into his unique and raw paintings.
Like
all the pre-war Hot Club Quintet rhythm guitarists, it is difficult to make a
valued judgement of his individual worth as there were always two of them. A
better appreciation of his ability can be made from his recordings with
Roger Chaput 1968 
