Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend (Paperback)

~ (Author) "HE WAS KNOWN AS DJANGO, a Gypsy name meaning "I awake..." (more)
Key Phrases: Hot Club, United States, New York (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this carefully researched biography, rich with details from interviews with family members, friends and musicians, Dregni, a writer for Vintage Guitar magazine, brings legendary Gypsy jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt (1910–1953) into the spotlight. Born in a Belgian caravan, Django began performing in Parisian dance halls at 12. In 1928, after a fire turned his left hand into a clawed hook, he learned to work the frets with just two fully mobile fingers, creating new chord forms and playing with stunning dexterity. With his brother and three other musicians—including celebrated violinist Stéphane Grappelli (staid, suave, classically trained, Stéphane was in many ways Django's opposite)—he formed a string jazz ensemble, Quintette du Hot Club de France, which started informally in 1934 and was, by 1937, nearly "falling apart under the strain of [its] own genius." But they kept playing, and their fame spread. Spared by the Nazis because a German kommandant liked his playing, Django became a national hero when one of his compositions, "Nuages," became the unofficial anthem of occupied France. Dregni casts Django as a mercurial, charismatic Romany innocent, alternately transfixed by gadjo life and dismissive of it. Colorful descriptions of the nightclubs of jazz-age Paris and sensitive appraisals of Django's musicianship add to the book's appeal.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt (1910-53) is the most famous Gypsy of all time. That he was very much a Gypsy--uncomfortable living in a building or one place for long, prone to blowing off engagements when he had enough money or something more interesting came up, infuriatingly proud and insouciant, reckless and hedonistic--is his most delightful aspect as a biographical subject, for from it springs a wealth of hilarious, outrageous, and touching stories. His career began during the rise of the bals musette style of French popular dance music; flared with unparalleled brilliance in the never-quite-formal Quintette du Hot Club de France, in which he and violinist Stephane Grappelli spurred one another to become the first European peers of Louis Armstrong; and peaked, paradoxically, in wartime Paris. Dregni couches Django's story in sketches of the musical styles and persons that crucially affected him, and vice versa, so that, despite anachronistic solecisms (e.g., "gothic sentimentality," "medieval guillotines") and grammatical gaffes, this biography is a splendid history of early European, especially French, jazz. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 344 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (May 12, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195304489
• ISBN-13: 978-0195304480
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #387,664 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Read, November 24, 2004

By	David Emery Bricker (Miami, FL United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend (Hardcover)

I'm always wary of books written about musicians by other musicians. I got this as a gift and expected a lot of worshipful prose about Django Reinhardt. Instead, I was delighted to find a very well-researched history which afforded Reinhardt the great respect he deserves as an innovative jazz musician, but doesn't patronize or idolize Django the person. What emerges is a good sense of Django as both a player and a man. This history of Gypsy jazz and the styles that influenced it have led me to new apprecation of recordings by players like Angelo DeBarre and even some of the Chopin Waltzes that were infleunced by the musette tradition. There's a whole side to Gyspy music that is not as obvious or as well-known as Django's jazz influences. For anyone, especially a guitarist, interested in this kind of music, this book will make an excellent addition to your library.

My only requests would be a list of sources for in-print recordings of some of the artists who were also mentioned in the book, like Baro Ferret who accompanied Django on many recordings but was apparently a virtuosic solist himself, and perhaps a few more pictures beyond the small but fascinating selection included.

Overall, this is a great piece of well-written research that will do a lot to encourage and preserve a very special musical tradition.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A book long overdue, November 17, 2004

By	Kidtulsa (Portland OR.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend (Hardcover)

In this book, Michael Dregni has done a wonderful job of putting the pieces together to tell the story of one of jazz history's most enigmatic, influential and inspired musicians. Usually, a critical look at a musician has to contend only with the prejudice and exaggeration of hearsay and legend, but in this book Dregni has also been confronted by the culture of shadows and secrets inhabited by the gipsies of Europe, no doubt making the process of connecting the dots of Django Reinhardt's story much more difficult. Gladly, he has done a marvelous job. The evocative prose succeeds in painting a picture not just of a life but of a time and place, equal parts romantic and real, that leaves the reader with an appreciation of what a truly remarkable man Django Reinhardt was and what a truly remarkable time it was in which he lived. Occasionally the book reminded me of a Jeunet film, an amber-hued voyage through a funhouse of dark corners, gypsy gangsters and cobblestones, all to the strains of an accordion heard through the rough doors of a bal-musette. Placed squarely in the the middle of such a milieu, Django emerges as a complex genius, his flights of musical inspiration bound by vanity and his artistic sophistication tempered by a childlike impetuousness and naivete'. Dregni thankfully does not allow his subject to dodge the dimmer aspects of the spotlight, painting a very human portrait of a man equally unreliable, duplicitous and vain yet devoted, sentimental and generous. Full flight is also given to Django's etherial magic-trick genius which resulted in, at times, perfect examples of inspired expression within the worldly context of a high art. There are many important reasons for Django Reinhardt's enormous influence on music (and jazz in particular), likewise for the legends and stories that surround both him and his surviving legacy, and I feel that this book does a wonderful job putting them into context for us. What an enjoyable and inspiring read.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Phenomenal!, November 30, 2005

By	Megan Romer (Ithaca, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend (Hardcover)

This is possibly one of the finest music biographies I've ever read (and I've read stacks). Instead of taking the tack of Django-worshipping, Dregni carefully and thoughtfully lays out all of the historical context around Django's life and music. This is a rarity among music biographies, which generally sum up historical context in literally just a few lines ("The Depression was over and times were tough, but the jukes were still swingin'"). Dregni does a fabulous job, and makes it interesting to boot.

He also doesn't cut Django too much slack, although he doesn't villainize him either. Genius is generally accompanied by a bit of madness, and always with a bit of narcissism, and Django had all of this, which doesn't make him a bad person, just a bit of a mad genius. Dregni did well expressing this.

All in all, Django had a phenomenal life and his body of work is practically unmatched in any genre, as far as quality and prolificness. Dregni simply gave us a historical context and a background behind the man who made it.

This book is recommended to jazz fans (whether gypsy jazz is your thing or not), musette fans, guitar players, Francophiles, those interested in gypsy culture, those interested in WWI and WWII, those interested in Paris in the '30s and '40s, history buffs, and so on.