Djangology friend Paul Mehling has sent along the exciting news that the HCSF will be appearing at Yoshi’s to kick off 2008 with two great shows! Long considered California’s premier club for jazz, Yoshi’s has hosted Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Peterson, and many more jazz giants over the years. Kudos to Paul and Co. for bringing more Gypsy jazz to the scene!
Yoshi’s at Jack London Square is located at 510 Embarcadero West in Oakland, CA. The HCSF will appear Monday January 7th, with shows at 8 and 10pm. Tickets are available here for the show; the 10pm set is at a discounted price to encourage students and young jazz lovers to attend (all shows at Yoshi’s are all ages). Note that the jazz club is separate from the restaurant, and if you plan on eating at Yoshi’s you’ll need to make dinner reservations for an hour to an hour and a half before showtime.

Barry from the HCP has written to let us know about a great sounding gig in Philadelphia: his own Hot Club of Philly is opening for the John Jorgenson Qunitet at World Cafe in Philly. The venue holds about 300 people, and Barry is doing his best to fill it, and it looks like it’s filling fast. John is touring with violinist Jason Anick-a great young player whom I played with a few times this summer, Jason’s musicality is really something and promises to be a smoking addition to John’s band. HCP is joined by vocalist Phyllis Chapell, who knocks out crowds with her bilingual singing. Tickets are available here-get ‘em now!
As an aside, these are the kinds of gigs-the medium sized venues with good local acts supporting a touring headliner-that make live gypsy jazz a possibility, so please support this gig and all the others like it!

Our friend Denis Chang is swinging into Boston this February to host one of his intensive 4 HOUR workshops. Those of you familiar with Denis’ DVD on Gypsy Rhythm know Denis has a deep understanding of the style and how to teach it. Those of you new to Denis’ work can expect the best workshop you’ll ever attend. After years of travel and study with the leading players in the world, Denis brings first hand experience and expertise to his teaching, and it shows. One caveat: Denis strongly recommends bringing either an audio or (preferably) video recorder to the workshop, as he teaches through playing, rather than relying on transcribed handouts.
The location and exact date are yet to be determined (he’ll be in town February 21-23); for more information, send Denis an email. In the meantime, here is Denis’ description of the workshop.

Denis Chang Workshop
4 hours – 80$
-rhythm coaching session. I will show and explain the common rhythm styles of the great rhythm players (Hono Winterstein, Nous’che Rosenberg, Hervé Gaguenetti, etc…). We will work on synchronization exercises for both hands. We will discuss rhythmic effects, and various styles of accompaniment.
-Gypsy Jazz picking technique. We will take examples from the masters (django, stochelo, jimmy, angelo, bireli) to demonstrate the various ways this technique can be used.
-Improvisation. We will start from scratch using basic chord progressions and explore the various colors and substitutions we can use to make an interesting solo. It is an in-depth study on voice leading and rhythmic phrasing.
-Advanced substitutions. For those who are more interested in modern approaches to django’s music, we will study various chord substitutions, symmetrical scales and how we can we apply them.
This workshop is EXTREMELY intensive and it is strongly recommended that participants bring a tape recorder or video camera.
I know how most workshops go (especially in GJ) they’re often very terrible and advanced students end up paying money for something they already knew, or at best, they learn a few things but the other students slow them down.
I have a different system for my workshop. First of all, it is 4 hours long. Second of all, I try to keep student participation to a minimum, students participating are often more for demonstration. The workshop is designed for all levels, but actually geared more toward people like you.
The way I work is I try to get maybe at least one beginner, one intermediate and one advanced student to participate so that everyone in attendance can recognize themselves.
The workshop itself is 100% gypsy jazz in approach. I believe I’ve come up with a simple and effective way to explain the masters approac this music.
The first part of the workshop is on technique and it is exhaustive. A lot of people make a few mistakes in the way the technique is used, and they’re a bit too systematic with it, when in fact it’s something fairly natural and depends a lot on rhythm and tempo… So i would like to show a few of these overlooked and important concepts.
We also talk about the left hand, because it is as important as the right hand. A lot of people have the technique down, but they still dont have that “particular” sound that is instantly recognizable (when we listen to say django, bireli, stochelo or angelo) because they’re actually overlooking some important left hand articulation concepts.
I will also talk a lot about rhythm, because in all styles, and really especially in this one, it is the secret to unlocking the picking technique and the first step to being able to solo (all the big names spent time playing rhythm for someone at some point, django, bireli, angelo, etc…).
Then I show my voice-leading method to explain gypsy jazz improvisation, but again it is based strictly on the django tradition. All the examples come from django, stochelo , bireli, etc.. the masters… towards the end, i also try to show a few more advanced concepts that advanced players may be aware of… but i show how to apply it within the style, and how guys like bireli or wawau adler use some of these.
For examples of Denis’ teaching, visit youtube and watch excerpts of his Rhythm Lessons:

San Francisco guitarist Ned Boynton has teamed up with Michael Zisman (mandolin), Jason Vanderford (rhythm guitar), and Robin Nolan Trio member Simon Planting (bass) to bring us the Hot Club derived sounds of Cafe Americain. Not simply another group of Django copyists, Boynton and company find inspiration in bossa nova, Brazilian choros, and the timeless songs of the Great American Songbook as well as the ‘gypsy jazz’ of Django Reinhardt and his followers.
The group’s debut CD includes few of the songs popular among Hot Club aficionados-of the discs thirteen tunes, only Honeysuckle Rose and perhaps I’ll Never Be the Same will jump out to most as familiar jazz tunes, and that is a wonderful thing (though their sultry take on Goldfinger will surely strike a chord with men of a certain age). The bulk of the disc, though, is made up of a mix of lesser-known tunes such as Jacob do Bandolim’s effervescent Tira Poeira, the American jazz of Fats Waller’s Jitterbug Waltz, and even the Santo & Johnny classic Sleepwalk (if you think you don’t know that one, you’re wrong).
The band seems to want to appeal to a broad range of listeners and club owners, and this disc will serve them well. It’s a pleasure to be reminded that playing jazz on a Selmer-style guitar doesn’t mean that everything has to be played at a hummingbird tempo, or in a rhythmic lockstep. The pace never really rises above a medium bounce, lending the disc an easy-going feel that makes it sure to fit in most anywhere. If there’s one real complaint I have with the disc, it’s that it’s almost too easy-going; given the wide range of styles the band assays, I would have enjoyed hearing them really tear into a song or two. But one gets the feeling that Cafe Americain is much happier living outside of definitions, and their music, drawn from all over, is the better for it.
Cafe Americain plays at Caffé Trieste in San Francisco every Wednesday at 7pm. To hear more of their music, visit their website. To buy the CD, click here!