Manouche and The Bloomsbury Incident

Manouche means gypsy in French and the style of string band jazz played by The Quintette du Hot Club de France (Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grapelli's vehicle) came to be called manouche jazz.

In 2010 in Stellenbosch a group of possibly academically trained musicians formed a band they called Manouche, dedicated to giving us a contemporary twist on the sound of Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli.

In 2010 Flip Swiegers brought me two Manouche tunes (“Bluesy Swing / Minor Swing” and “Willemology”) as MP3 tracks and I was really thrown by this modern take on a sound I had loved for many years. I once owned a CD compilation of tracks by die Quintette du Hot Club (it was stolen and I've never come across it again) that, along with a CD (also stolen) of sides from Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven combos, were among my top favourite albums. This was music that was pure primal rock and roll to me even if it was called jazz. Miles Davis it wasn't. Manouche brought me back to that music.

The concept was so archaic and esoteric that I thought it would be no more than an interesting diversion for the musicians. In mid-August 2011 I was browsing in the African Music Store in Long Street, a favourite haunt, when I saw Manouche's debut album The Bloomsbury Incident on the shelf.  I bought it, took it home and fell in love with the music again.  

the band comprises 2 guitars, violin, accordion; upright bass and a drummer who plays what once were called “traps”. Four guys and two gals dressed in clothes that make them look like inhabitants of a lost Paris of the Thirties, where the bistros were smoke filled and hot jazz was the music de jour.  Eldred Schilder plays the bass and my guess is that he must be yet another talented member of the Schilder clan that has given us the late Tony Schilder and the very much living Hilton Schilder.

Bernard Kotze wrote all of the tunes on the album except for “Minor Swing” which is a Django Reinhardt composition, and “I've Found A New Baby,” which sounds like a song from that same lost Thirties era.

“Bluesy Swing / Minor Swing” is the opening track of the album and it lays out the Manouche wares: up tempo syncopated rhythms, fleet fingered lead guitar solos, fiery and melodic violin solos and accordion flavouring. It is toe tapping and smiling music. It is mostly jaunty and sprightly; nostalgia does not have to mean introspection, but there is a bit of that too.

The numbers are all-instrumental except for “Silly Superstition” which has breathy female vocal that is part sexy and part innocent, though the sexiness wins out in the end.