Django Reinhardt facts for kids

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Jean Reinhardt (born January 23, 1910 – died May 16, 1953), known by his Romani nickname Django, was a famous Romani-Belgian jazz guitarist and composer. He was one of the first major jazz stars to come from Europe and is seen as one of the most important jazz musicians ever.

With violinist Stéphane Grappelli, Reinhardt started the Paris-based Quintette du Hot Club de France in 1934. This group was one of the first to play jazz where the guitar was the main instrument. Reinhardt recorded music in France with many American musicians who visited, like Coleman Hawkins and Benny Carter. He also toured the United States briefly with Duke Ellington's orchestra in 1946. He sadly died suddenly from a stroke in 1953 when he was 43 years old.

Reinhardt's most popular songs have become well-known tunes in gypsy jazz. These include "Minor Swing", "Daphne", "Belleville", "Djangology", "Swing '42", and "Nuages". Jazz guitarist Frank Vignola says that almost every important popular-music guitarist in the world has been influenced by Reinhardt. For many years now, annual Django festivals have been held across Europe and the U.S. A book has also been written about his life. In February 2017, a French film about him, called Django, was shown for the first time at the Berlin International Film Festival.

Quick facts for kids Django Reinhardt
Reinhardt in 1946
Background information
Birth name	Jean Reinhardt
Born	(1910-01-23)23 January 1910 Liberchies, Pont-à-Celles, Belgium
Died	16 May 1953(1953-05-16) (aged 43) Samois-sur-Seine, France
Genres	Jazz, gypsy jazz, bebop, Romani music
Occupation(s)	Musician, composer
Instruments	Guitar, violin, banjo
Years active	1928–1953
Associated acts	Stéphane Grappelli, Quintette du Hot Club de France

The Life of Django Reinhardt

Early Years and Musical Start

Reinhardt was born on January 23, 1910, in Liberchies, Belgium. His family was Manouche Romani. His father, Jean Eugene Weiss, used his wife's last name, Reinhardt, to avoid being forced into the French military. His mother, Laurence Reinhardt, was a dancer.

Django spent most of his childhood in Romani camps near Paris. There, he started playing the violin, banjo, and guitar. He became very good at playing quickly. He learned by watching other musicians and from his uncle Guiligou. By the age of 15, Reinhardt was earning money by playing music in cafes, often with his brother Joseph. At this time, he had not yet started playing jazz. He had probably heard American jazz bands like Billy Arnold's and found them interesting. He had little formal education and learned to read and write only when he was an adult.

A Life-Changing Accident

When he was 17, Reinhardt married Florine "Bella" Mayer from the same Romani community. The next year, he made his first recordings in 1928. On these recordings, Reinhardt played the banjo-guitar with accordion players and a singer. His playing started to get international attention. A British bandleader named Jack Hylton even came to France just to hear him play and offered him a job.

However, before he could start with the band, Reinhardt had a terrible accident. On November 2, 1928, a candle in his wagon accidentally started a fire. The wagon quickly burned. Django and his wife escaped, but Reinhardt suffered serious burns on half of his body. He was in the hospital for 18 months. Doctors thought they might have to remove his badly hurt right leg, but Reinhardt refused. He eventually learned to walk with a cane.

Even more important for his music, the ring and pinky fingers of Reinhardt's left hand were badly burned. Doctors believed he would never play guitar again. But Reinhardt worked very hard to relearn how to play. His brother, Joseph Reinhardt, who was also a good guitarist, bought him a new guitar. Django never fully regained the use of his two injured fingers. Instead, he became a master musician by focusing on his left index and middle fingers. He used the injured fingers only for playing chords. Within a year of the fire, in 1929, Bella Mayer gave birth to their son, Henri "Lousson" Reinhardt. Soon after, the couple separated.

Discovering Jazz Music

After separating from his wife and son, Reinhardt traveled around France. He found occasional jobs playing music in small clubs. He lived day-to-day, spending his earnings as soon as he made them. His new girlfriend, Sophie Ziegler, nicknamed "Naguine," traveled with him. She was a distant cousin.

In the years after the fire, Reinhardt was recovering and trying out new things on the guitar his brother gave him. He had played many types of music. Then, a friend named Émile Savitry introduced him to American jazz. Savitry had records by famous musicians like Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Joe Venuti and Eddie Lang. Hearing their music gave Reinhardt a new goal: to become a professional jazz musician.

While he was getting more interested in jazz, Reinhardt met Stéphane Grappelli. Grappelli was a young violinist who also loved jazz. In early 1934, both Reinhardt and Grappelli were playing in Louis Vola's band.

Starting the Famous Quintet

From 1934 until World War II began in 1939, Reinhardt and Grappelli worked together. They were the main soloists of their new group, the Quintette du Hot Club de France, in Paris. This group became the most skilled and creative European jazz group of that time.

Reinhardt's brother Joseph and Roger Chaput also played guitar in the Quintette, and Louis Vola played bass. The Quintette was special because it was one of the few well-known jazz groups made up only of stringed instruments.

In Paris, Reinhardt made recordings in 1933 and 1934. Many of their recordings featured other instruments, but the all-string sound is what made the Hot Club famous. Decca Records in the United States released three records by the Quintette with Reinhardt on guitar in 1935. Reinhardt also played and recorded with many American jazz musicians, such as Adelaide Hall, Coleman Hawkins, Benny Carter, and Rex Stewart. He even played in a jam session and radio show with Louis Armstrong. Later, Reinhardt played with Dizzy Gillespie in France. In 1938, Reinhardt's quintet played for thousands of people in London. The American film actor Eddie Cantor was in the audience. After their performance, Cantor went on stage and kissed Reinhardt's hand.

World War II and Challenges

Reinhardt in 1944, photographed at Studio Harcourt

When World War II started, the original quintet was touring in the United Kingdom. Reinhardt quickly went back to Paris, but Grappelli stayed in the UK for the whole war. Reinhardt then started a new version of the quintet, with Hubert Rostaing on clarinet instead of Grappelli.

During the war, being a Romani jazz musician was very dangerous for Reinhardt. The Nazis saw jazz as "un-German." Romani people were treated very badly, forced into camps, and many were killed. In France, Romani people were used as forced labor. During the Holocaust, an estimated 600,000 to 1.5 million Romani people were killed across Europe.

However, official rules about jazz were not as strict in occupied France. Jazz music was often played on the radio. Many American musicians had left Paris at the start of the war, which meant more work for French musicians. Reinhardt was the most famous jazz musician in Europe at the time. He worked steadily and earned a lot of money, but he was always in danger.

Reinhardt tried new things with his music during this time. He used an early sound system and played with bigger bands that had horn sections. He also tried writing classical music, like a Mass for the Gypsies and a symphony. Since he couldn't read music, he worked with an assistant to write down what he was playing. His modern song "Rythme Futur" was also meant to be acceptable to the Nazis.

In 1943, Reinhardt married his long-time partner Sophie "Naguine" Ziegler. They had a son, Babik Reinhardt, who also became a respected guitarist.

As the war turned against the Germans in 1943, life in Paris became much harder. Food and supplies were very limited. Some of Django's friends were captured by the Nazis or joined the resistance movement. Reinhardt tried to escape from Occupied France once but was caught. Luckily, a German officer who loved jazz, Dietrich Schulz-Köhn, allowed him to return to Paris. Reinhardt tried to escape again a few days later but was stopped by Swiss border guards and sent back to Paris.

One of his songs, "Nuages" (meaning "Clouds"), released in 1940, became a symbol of hope for freedom in Paris. At one concert, the song was so popular that the crowd made him play it three times in a row. Over 100,000 copies of the song were sold. Unlike many other Romani people, Reinhardt survived the war.

Touring the United States

Reinhardt and Duke Ellington at the Aquarium in New York, c. November 1946

After the war, Reinhardt met up with Grappelli again in the UK. In the fall of 1946, he went on his first tour in the United States. He first played at Cleveland Music Hall as a special guest with Duke Ellington and His Orchestra. He played with many musicians and composers. At the end of the tour, Reinhardt played two nights at Carnegie Hall in New York City. He received a huge cheer and came out for six bows on the first night.

Even though he was proud to tour with Ellington, he wasn't fully part of the band. He played a few songs at the end of the show, with Ellington's band backing him, but no special music was written just for him. After the tour, Reinhardt got a job at Café Society Uptown, where he played four solos a day with the house band. These shows attracted many people. He had forgotten to bring his usual Selmer Modèle Jazz guitar and had to play a borrowed electric guitar. He felt this made it harder to play his delicate style. He had been promised jobs in California, but they didn't happen. Tired of waiting, Reinhardt went back to France in February 1947.

After the Quintet Years

After returning to France, Reinhardt went back to his Romani way of life. He found it hard to get used to the world after the war. Sometimes, he would show up for concerts without his guitar or amplifier. Other times, he would wander off to the park or the beach. On a few occasions, he refused to get out of bed. Reinhardt became known for being very unreliable among his band, fans, and managers. He would miss sold-out concerts to "walk to the beach" or "smell the dew." During this time, he continued to visit the R-26 artistic salon in Montmartre, where he would improvise with his friend, Stéphane Grappelli.

In Rome in 1949, Reinhardt hired three Italian jazz musicians (on bass, piano, and drums) and recorded over 60 songs in a studio. He played with Grappelli again, using his acoustic Selmer-Maccaferri guitar. These recordings were first released in the late 1950s.

Back in Paris in June 1950, Reinhardt was invited to a special event to welcome Benny Goodman back. He also went to a party for Goodman. After the war, Goodman had asked Reinhardt to join him in the U.S. Goodman repeated his invitation, and Reinhardt politely accepted. However, Reinhardt later thought about what his role would be next to Goodman, who was known as the "King of Swing," and decided to stay in France.

Final Years and Legacy

Plaque commemorating Reinhardt at Samois-sur-Seine

In 1951, Reinhardt moved to Samois-sur-Seine, near Fontainebleau, where he lived until he died. He continued to play in Paris jazz clubs and started playing the electric guitar. In his last recordings, made with his Nouvelle Quintette in the final months of his life, he began to explore a new musical style. He mixed the sounds of bebop with his own melodic style.

On May 16, 1953, after playing in a Paris club, he was walking home from the Gare de Fontainebleau–Avon Station when he collapsed outside his house. He had a brain hemorrhage. It was a Saturday, and it took a full day for a doctor to arrive. Reinhardt was declared dead at the hospital in Fontainebleau. He was 43 years old.

Django's Unique Playing Style

Reinhardt learned his first musical skills from his relatives and by watching other gypsy guitar players. He then played the banjo-guitar with accordion players in the Paris dance halls called bal-musettes. He mostly used a plectrum (a guitar pick) to get the loudest sound, especially in the 1920s and early 1930s when there was little or no amplification in venues. He could also play with his fingers sometimes.

After his accident in 1928, his left hand was badly burned, and he lost most of the use of his ring and pinky fingers. He developed a completely new way of playing with his left hand. He started playing guitar for popular singers before he discovered jazz. Then, he brought his new mix of gypsy style and jazz to the world with the Quintette du Hot Club de France.

Even with his injured left hand, Reinhardt was able to play the guitar better than before. He became not only a great lead player but also a strong and interesting rhythm player. His amazing skill, which included many gypsy influences, was matched by his wonderful ability to create melodies. He also had a great sense of timing and could get a wide range of sounds from his guitar, which many people thought was limited. He played completely by ear, meaning he couldn't read or write music. He could play easily in any key and move freely across the guitar neck, letting his musical imagination soar.

Because of his damaged left hand, Reinhardt had to change how he played both chords and melodies. For chords, he created a new system using mostly 3-note chords. These chords could sound like several different regular chords. For high notes, he could use his ring and pinky fingers to press the strings, even though he couldn't move these fingers separately. In some chords, he also used his left thumb on the lowest string. In his fast melodic solos, he often used arpeggios (playing notes of a chord one after another). He could play these using two notes per string with his two "good" fingers (index and middle) while moving up or down the guitar neck. This was different from the usual way of moving across strings in one position. He also created some of his special "effects" by quickly moving a fixed shape (like a diminished chord) up and down the guitar neck. To see these techniques in action, you can watch the only known video of Reinhardt playing, for the short jazz film Le Jazz Hot in 1938–39. He is playing an instrumental version of the song "J'Attendrai."

In his later style (from about 1946 onwards), Reinhardt started to add more bebop influences to his songs and improvisations. He also put an electric pickup on his acoustic guitar. With amplification, his playing became more like a horn, with longer notes and the ability to be heard in quiet parts. He relied less on his gypsy "tricks" that he developed for his acoustic guitar style. These "electric period" recordings by Reinhardt are less well-known than his earlier ones, but they are a fascinating part of his work and are being rediscovered by musicians today.

Django's Family of Musicians

Reinhardt's first son, Lousson (also known as Henri Baumgartner), played jazz in a style called bebop in the 1950s and 1960s. He lived the Romani lifestyle and didn't record much music. Reinhardt's second son, Babik, became a guitarist who played a more modern jazz style. He recorded several albums before he passed away in 2001. After Django died, his younger brother Joseph at first promised to stop playing music. But he was convinced to perform and record again. Joseph's son, Markus Reinhardt, is a violinist who plays in the Romani style.

A third generation of Django's direct family has also become musicians. David Reinhardt, Django's grandson (Babik's son), leads his own trio. Dallas Baumgartner, a great-grandson through Lousson, is a guitarist who travels with the Romani people and keeps a low public profile. A distant relative, violinist Schnuckenack Reinhardt, was known in Germany for playing gypsy music and gypsy jazz until his death in 2006. He helped keep Django's music alive after Django passed away.

Django's Lasting Influence

Festival Django Reinhardt in France

Reinhardt is considered one of the greatest guitar players of all time. He was also the first important European jazz musician to make a big impact with jazz guitar. During his career, he wrote almost 100 songs.

Using a Selmer guitar in the mid-1930s, his playing became louder and more expressive. Because of his physical injury, he mostly played using his index and middle fingers. This led him to create a very unique style of jazz guitar.

For about ten years after Reinhardt died, people weren't very interested in his music. In the 1950s, bebop jazz became popular, rock and roll started, and electric instruments took over in popular music. But since the mid-1960s, there has been a renewed interest in Reinhardt's music. This interest continues into the 21st century, with yearly festivals and tribute concerts. Famous guitarists like classical guitarist Julian Bream and country guitarist Chet Atkins were big fans. Atkins thought Django was one of the ten greatest guitarists of the twentieth century.

Jazz guitarists in the U.S., like Charlie Byrd and Wes Montgomery, were influenced by his style. Byrd, who lived from 1925 to 1999, said that Reinhardt was his main influence. Guitarist Mike Peters says that the word "genius" is used too much, "But in jazz, Louis Armstrong was a genius, Duke Ellington was another one, and Reinhardt was also." David Grisman adds, "As far as I'm concerned, no one since has come anywhere close to Django Reinhardt as an improviser or technician."

The popularity of gypsy jazz has led to more and more festivals. These include the Festival Django Reinhardt held every last weekend of June since 1983 in Samois-sur-Seine (France). There are also various DjangoFests across Europe and the U.S., and Django in June, which is an annual camp for Gypsy jazz musicians and fans.

Woody Allen's film Sweet and Lowdown (1999) is about a character like Django Reinhardt. The movie mentions Reinhardt and includes his actual recordings.

Tributes to Django

In February 2017, the Berlin International Film Festival showed the world premiere of Django, a French film directed by Etienne Comar. The movie shows Django's escape from Nazi-occupied Paris in 1943. It highlights how, even under "constant danger, flight and the terrible things done to his family," he kept composing and performing. Reinhardt's music for the film was re-recorded by the Dutch jazz band Rosenberg Trio with lead guitarist Stochelo Rosenberg.

The documentary film Djangomania! was released in 2005. This hour-long film was directed and written by Jamie Kastner. He traveled around the world to show how Django's music has influenced different countries.

In 1984, the Kool Jazz Festival, held in Carnegie Hall and Avery Fisher Hall, was completely dedicated to Reinhardt. Performers included Grappelli, Benny Carter, and Mike Peters with his group. The festival was organized by George Wein. Reinhardt is celebrated every year in the village of Liberchies, where he was born.

Many musicians have written and recorded songs honoring Reinhardt. The jazz song "Django" (1954) was written by John Lewis of the Modern Jazz Quartet to honor Reinhardt. The Allman Brothers Band song "Jessica" was written by Dickey Betts as a tribute to Reinhardt. American country music artists Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard named their last album together "Django and Jimmie." It was released in 2015 and includes the song "Django and Jimmie" which honors musicians Django Reinhardt and Jimmie Rodgers.

Ramelton, in Co. Donegal, Ireland, hosts a yearly festival honoring Django called "Django sur Lennon" or "Django on the Lennon." The Lennon is the name of the local river.

In 2020, for Django's 110th birthday, a graphic novel about his younger years was published. It is called Django Main de Feu and was written by Salva Rubio and drawn by Efa. On January 23, 2010, Google Doodle celebrated Django Reinhardt’s 100th Birthday.

Musicians Influenced by Django

Many guitar players and other musicians have said they admire Reinhardt or that he was a big influence on them. Jeff Beck called Reinhardt "by far the most astonishing guitar player ever" and "quite superhuman."

Grateful Dead's Jerry Garcia and Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi both lost fingers in accidents. They were inspired by Reinhardt's example of becoming a skilled guitar player despite his injuries. Denny Laine and Jimmy McCulloch, who were members of Paul McCartney's band Wings, have said he was an inspiration. Andrew Latimer, from the band Camel, has also stated that he was influenced by Reinhardt.

Willie Nelson has been a lifelong fan of Reinhardt. In his memoir, he said, "This was a man who changed my musical life by giving me a whole new perspective on the guitar and, on an even more profound level, on my relationship with sound...During my formative years, as I listened to Django's records, especially songs like 'Nuages' that I would play for the rest of my life, I studied his technique. Even more, I studied his gentleness. I love the human sound he gave his acoustic guitar."

Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin said: "Django Reinhardt was fantastic. He must have been playing all the time to be that good."

Django's Music Recordings

Recordings Made During His Life

Reinhardt recorded over 900 songs during his career, from 1928 to 1953. Most of these were on 78-RPM records. Some were also on other types of recordings or from radio broadcasts and a film soundtrack. Only one recording session (eight songs) from March 1953 was made specifically for a new LP record format by Norman Granz. But Reinhardt died before the album could be released. In his earliest recordings, Reinhardt played banjo-guitar with accordion players and singers on popular tunes, without any jazz. In his last recordings before he died, he played amplified guitar in the bebop style with younger, more modern French musicians.

There is a full list of his recordings available. You can also find an index of individual songs. A few short film clips of him playing (without original sound) still exist. There is also one complete performance with sound, of the song "J'Attendrai," played with the Quintet in 1938 for the short film Le Jazz Hot.

Collections of His Music (Released After He Died)

Since his death, Reinhardt's music has been released on many collections. Intégrale Django Reinhardt, volumes 1–20 (40 CDs), released by the French company Frémeaux from 2002 to 2005, tried to include every known song he played on.

The Great Artistry of Django Reinhardt (Clef, 1954)
Parisian Swing (GNP Crescendo, 1965)
Quintet of the Hot Club of France (GNP Crescendo, 1965)
Paris 1945 with Glenn Miller All-Stars (French Columbia, 1973)
Django Reinhardt: The Versatile Giant (Inner City Records, 1978)
At Club St. Germain (Honeysuckle, 1983)
Swing Guitar (Jass, 1991)
Djano Reinhardt in Brussels (Verve, 1992)
Django Reinhardt & Stephane Grappelli (GNP Crescendo, 1990)
Peche à La Mouche: The Great Blue Star Sessions 1947–1953 (Verve, 1992)
Django's Music (Hep, 1994)
Brussels and Paris (DRG, 1996)
Quintet of the Hot Club of France (Original Jazz Classics, 1997)
Django with His American Friends (DRG, 1998)
The Complete Django Reinhardt HMV Sessions (1998)
The Classic Early Recordings in Chronological Order (2000)
Djangology (Bluebird, 2002)
Intégrale Django Reinhardt (Frémeaux, 2002)
Jazz in Paris: Nuages (2003)
Vol. 2: 1938–1939 (Naxos, 2001)
Swing Guitars Vol. 3 1936–1937 (Naxos, 2003)
Nuages Vol. 6 1940 (Naxos, 2004)
Django on the Radio (2008)
Djangology: Solo and Duet Recordings (2019)

Other Recordings He Played On

Coleman Hawkins The Coleman Hawkins Collection 1927-1956 (2014)
Charles Trenet Intégrale Charles Trénet: 1933-1947 (2004)

Songs He Wrote But Never Recorded

A few waltzes that Reinhardt composed when he was young were never recorded by him. However, his friends kept playing them, and some are still played today. These songs became known through recordings by Matelo Ferret in 1960 and 1961. The names "Gagoug" and "Choti" were reportedly given by Django's wife, Naguine, when Matelo asked for them, as he had learned the tunes without names. Django also worked on writing a Mass (a type of religious music) for the Romani people. It was not finished, but an 8-minute part of it exists. It was played by organist Léo Chauliac for Reinhardt's benefit during a 1944 radio broadcast.