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| Gypsyjazz Teachers |
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Daniele Spadavecchia was born and raised in Italy, beginning to play guitar at the age of 16 in local bands. He then studied guitar and music starting with classical, rumba flamenco, blues, funk, R&B, rock and gypsy jazz with professional teachers and practical experience, becoming an accomplished performer and singer. He played for New Orleans Jazz Festival, TV and Radio shows, clubs, restaurants, corporate and private events, concerts, churches, cruises, even Italian gondolas!
In 2000, he started playing gypsy jazz when he was living in Rome to join a local band called NuoveTribu’ Zulu, and started also taking flamenco lessons. He then moved to New Orleans where he played rhythm guitar for Tony Green & Gypsy Jazz for two and a half years. At the same time, he started a band called Sicilian Swing, combining gypsy jazz guitar with Italian swing songs, voice, upright bass and percussions. After, he brought gypsy jazz to Scottsdale, AZ where he started a band called Desert Hot Swing playing also with members of the Hot Club of Tucson, and finally, to San Diego.
Daniele taught guitar for 15 years in music schools, guitar studios and private lessons, basing his method on a mix of a solid and healthy technique, theory and the personal taste of each student.
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Fabrice Vignati has discovered Musette and Gypsy Jazz music during his youth by listening and attending weekly “Bal Musette” in his hometown of Aix-les-Bains and others small villages in Savoie (French Alps).
Attracted by the sound of the guitar and the combination with accordion, he started playing rhythm in these weekly gathering meanwhile getting classical trained for 4 years at the age of 8 years old, he then ventured into Rockabilly, Blues, and Jazz music for a few years before coming back to Gypsy Jazz while in Belgium, Django Reinhardt’s native Country. Passionate by American Jazz, Fabrice moved to Los Angeles, where he has worked on different projects such as a jazz quartet "The Mystic Band", and a big band "The Ikeda Kings Orchestra", both performing jazz standards, "Les Zazous" (Zoot Suits a 7 piece band) and "Swingfinger" (an instrumental band), both Django Reinhardt style Swing Bands.
He is currently leading a unique project, The Hot Fab Djazz Club, a wonderful group from Los Angeles which perpetuates the sound of Django Reinhardt with mainly an assortment of French & American popular and original vocal tunes.
His love for music is unconditional whether it is playing, listening, writing, studying, producing or teaching. He agrees that music transcends time, space and color which contributes to the happiness of humankind. Those who know music and those who merely enjoy listening would do well to become part of his world
and learn how to further developing your own sound and feel of Jazz and Gypsy Jazz music just as Django Reinhardt did in his living time despite his physical hindrance.
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Louis Fanucchi
Louis Fanucchi’s B.M. degree from San Diego State University on accordion performance along with six years under the great accordion teacher Anthohy Galla-Rini, has prepared him for an award-winning musical career that includes acting in movies, commercials and live theater.
Fanucchi has shared venues and performed with Luciano Pavarotti, Bette Midler, Rodney Dangerfield, Jerry Vale, Frankie Lane, Frankie Avalon and other celebrities plus appearances with symphonies, theatre and ballet companies throughout the USA including the San Diego Symphony and the Old Globe theatre.
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Michael Viteri
Houston, Texas
I have been playing guitar for over 20 years and "Gypsy-Jazz" for more than 10 years. In that time I've been fortunate to play in a band "The Gypsies", a 30+ year old band which plays everything from Hungarian, Russian, Klezmer, Tango, and swing. Most of what I know comes from the source of it all: Europe. There I studied with several great players including Angelo Debarre and Fapy Lafertin. I prefer the old school players and try to pass on that style. More quality than quantity of notes. Feel free to contat me at djangophile@yahoo.com or 713-382-5395
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Paul Gruen first started playing gypsy jazz guitar in 1973, after already having played guitar for at least ten years, using a dreadnought(!) and medium-gauge bronze strings(!!), and working off of "'78s" of the Quintette of the Hot Club of France! At the time, the term "gypsy jazz" probably did not exist, almost no one in the U.S. had a proper gypsy jazz guitar, strings, or picks, and there were no instruction books on gypsy jazz. In the past 30+ years Paul has developed his gypsy jazz style and has also studied other styles of jazz guitar. Paul studied under Ciro Mancuso, a gypsy-jazz guitarist and acquaintance of Stephane Grappelly (Mancuso actually saw Django perform!). Paul was most recently a founder and the lead guitarist in the Europa Jazz Quartet, a gypsy-jazz quartet in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. To hear MP3s of the Europa Jazz Quartet and Paul's playing, go to www.gruenacousticguitars. (Click on "hear my guitars" and choose MP3s by that group.) Paul's teaching style is flexible, depending on the abilities of each student, but proper technique is the first consideration. Paul believes that gypsy jazz is a form of jazz, not an extension of bluegrass music, and that just as Django was trying to play jazz, students of "gypsy jazz" should learn jazz and be trained to be able to incorporate diverse jazz tunes and harmonies into their playing, to move gypsy jazz forward (just as Django was doing up to the end of his life).
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Charles has a Batchelor’s degree in Guitar Performance from G.S.U. and Emory. In his classical studies he has attended master classes with Christopher Parkening, Jose Thomas, and others. He was a founding member and the original guitarist for The Aquarium Rescue Unit featuring Col. Hampton, this was one of the progenitors of the early 1990s jamband scene along with Phish and others. Two of his songs recorded on the band’s Capricorn CDs were subsequently performed regularly by Kevin Eubanks on the Jay Leno Show. Other alumni of that group includes Jimmy Herring, (The Dead, Phil and Friends), Otiel Burbridge, (Allman Bros), and Jeff Sipe, (Jonas Hellborg and Shawn Lane. He is also a founding member of the Zambiland Orchestra, performing yearly for charity. Members of the Orchestra have included members of Widespread Panic, Phish, Allman Bros, Little Feat, etc. For the last 20 years he has been a student of Django's style and for the last 6 years have led a group in Atlanta, Ga. Named the Bonaventure Quartet. The BVQ has had both their CDs reviewed in Vintage Guitar Magazine by Michel Dregni, author of the definitive biography of Django. He says, "Atlanta's Bonaventure Quartet offers a fascinating amalgam of classic jazz, western swing, and plenty of originals - all arranged and played with the inspiration of Django Reinhardt…the Bonaventure Quartet may be steeped in Django's legacy, but on these two albums, they prove they're not just another Hot Club band. " MD Vintage Guitar, August 2005.
Additionally, in 2002 he contributed to a radio documentary, "Where is Django Playing" which has been broadcast on WKZE 98.1 New York and Deutschland Radio, Europe.
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Michael holds a B.A. from the Berklee College of Music, Boston; an M.A. in ethnomusicology from the University of Washington, Seattle; and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology at the University of Washington. During 2002 Michael received a Fulbright fellowship to conduct his dissertation research among the Sinti Gypsy jazz guitarists of The Netherlands. His teachers include Fapy Lafertin, Martin Limberger, Jan Limberger, and Paulus Schaefer.
In addition to academic pursuits, Michael has maintained an active performing schedule as both a band leader and a side man for numerous ensembles such as Hot Club Sandwich, Pearl Django, Zazou, and The Djangomatics. Michael is also a sought after DADGAD-style guitarist and has accompanied numerous Irish musicians such as Randal Bays and Skip Healy. He is the leader of the Seattle-based klezmer rock band Heavy Shtetl.
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A gypsy flamenco guitarist as well, Alfonso has been to Cordoba, Spain to study with the great flamenco guitarist Vicente Amigo. Alfonso is a multi-instrumentalist, having won the 1994 U.S. National Mountain Dulcimer Championship, and playing both banjo and guitar with the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra. He brings a wide and colorful repertoire from his many adventures in Spain, Italy, France, and all over the United States, including the Iridium in New York, where the legendary Les Paul invited Alfonso to play as a special guest with his trio. Alfonso is also a music educator in Chicago and introduced Django's music to the midwest United States nearly a decade ago, when he began teaching a weekly Django Guitar Styles Class at the Old Town School of Folk Music, one of the largest and most renowned folk music centers in the U.S. Alfonso is often invited to teach his popular workshops at festivals around the country.
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Teaches at "Bounty Music". Tom is the lead guitarist for the Maui-based band Gypsy Pacific and has studied privately with Jorge Strunz of Strunz & Farah, Ted Greene and Lenny Breau. In addition he was awarded a scholarship to the Wayne State University jazz program in Detroit, Michigan. Has a very clear understanding of harmony and improvisation as it applies to gypsy jazz. Tom has been profiled in Guitar Player's "Spotlight" column and recently he was the subject of a feature article in Vintage Guitar magazine titled "Gypsy Jazz from Hawaii".
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A music graduate of McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and recipient of the top scholarship award for guitarists from the Berklee College Of Music. Disciple of Fapy Lafertin, Stochelo Rosenberg. Frequently traveling to Europe to study with the masters. The only teacher in town specializing in correct technique in the django style and authentic transcriptions of gypsy jazz artists.
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From 1982-84 Don performed regularly in the Los Angeles area as a teacher and "guitar for hire" in various jazz venues. In 1997 the News & Review described Don''''s playing as "...jazz so hot it has to be cool..." Continuing his education, he attended Dick Grove School of Music and benefited from jazz masters Joe Diorio, Duke Miller, Pat Martino, Joe Pass, and of course his mentor Larry Coryell. As an educator, Don has taken part in instructional clinics with Frank Gambale, Al DiMeola, Steve Morse and Larry Coryell. He was a faculty member of the Guitar Activity Center (a vocational school originally started by the late M.I.T guitarist and senior faculty member Vic Trigger). Don currently teaches guitar at City College, and takes students on a private basis at Woodland Music & Guitar. His clinics have drawn enthusiastic responses and he has an instructional method that is currently used at the college level.
Don is currently working on an instructional book/CD/DVD for Mel Bay publications to be called "Gypsy Jazz Chord-Scale Connections."
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Sam Miltich is a teacher of the gypsy jazz guitar style. He has performed at Django festivals and concerts both in the United States as well as Europe. He has performed with his own group, The Clearwater Hot Club, the Robin Nolan Trio, Paul Mehling and the Hot Club of San Francisco, and Dorado and Samson Schmitt, as well as playing with other gypsy guitarist and violinists. As a teacher he will provide a strong technichal approach to the guitar, emphasizing both lead and rhythm techniques required to play this style. He will also teach basic jazz theory, repetoire building, and musical history of the style.
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Guitarist Paul Mehling, leader of the Hot Club of San Francisco for 13 years, has 9 Cds in the Gypsy-Swing tradition of Django Reinhardt & the Hot Club de France. A professional musician for over 25 years, he is also a multi-instrumentalist playing violin, mandolin, tenor and plectrum banjos. Internationally recognized as one of the leading players in the gypsy tradition he is equally recognized for his contributions to teaching this unique style. Having produced 2 videos for Homespun Tapes, one on rhythm techniques and one on soloing, with a 3 rd volume dealing specifically with the right hand due out in 2005. 1997 citation for excellence in Jazz Education by the IAJE. Staff columnist for Flatpicking Guitar magazine, column titled “Gypsy Guitar” Staff teacher for the Jazz Masters Workshops produced by Bruce Foreman since 1999 (see JazzMastersWorkshops.com) Festivals: Festival de Django Reinhardt (France)-2000, Festival de Jazz (Mexico)- 1996,1998, 2000, Django Reinhardt Festival (Iceland) 2001, Sacramento Jazz Jubilee-1994-1999, Bay Area DjangoFestival (California)2004 For more information see www.HCSF.com See also: Masters of the Jazz Guitar (Miller Freeman Books,1999) page 160, chapter on the legacy of Django Acoustic Guitar Magazine February 1996 cover story; Jazz Manouche by Michael Simmons, page 36
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While still regularly playing in the gypsy camps, Wrembel began bringing the music away from the campfires to festivals and clubs around France, making a name on the festival circuit performing traditional and Django inspired gypsy jazz. His quartet, Manoque, was awarded Best Young Band at Festival Jazz d'Avon in 1999 and in 2000. Wrembel had the honor of performing at the Tzigane Circus for the "Festival of the Imagination", the Jazzforville Festival and he appears every year at the Django Reinhardt Festival, playing with the gypsies.
Wrembel was impressed with the gypsies' oral tradition of teaching music to their children. "They keep the music sincere. They pass it from father to son, playing it within their family." Wrembel had been giving private lessons since 1991 and had started his own music school, Musique Pour Tous (Music for All), in 1994, teaching guitar, harmony and composition to approximately 30 students a year. The method, based on learning the fundamentals of the instrument before integrating more complicated studies, is still taught at the 1999 expansion of Wrembel's school, The Institut Europeen de Formation Aux Arts Rythmiques (European Institute for the Art of Rhythm).
In 2000, after finishing his studies in Arranging and Composition at the American School of Modern Music in Paris, Wrembel left his students in the hands of other teachers and moved to Boston to attend Berklee College of Music on an International Scholarship. Recently graduated with a Professional Diploma in Performance from Berklee, Wrembel plays regularly in New England and has just completed recording his first US album.
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Guitarist Don King, the founder of the group Club Django in Los Angeles has performed and recorded with many of Southern California leading blues and R&B bands. He is also featured on several recordings on the avant-garde label Roughedge Records. Don specializes in the verbatim transcription and performance of works by Django Reinhardt and other great Gypsy guitarists and has published a book of eleven Gypsy waltzes transcriptions. Don is responsible for most of Club Django’s arrangements
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Rick Leppanen, the premier northwest gypsy jazz bassist, bringing a solid sense of swing and a strong jazz background. January 1999 brought the release of Pearl DJango's Mystery Pacific album, and with that CD Pearl Django solidified it's reputation as one of the most versatile and rhythmically compelling acoustic groups playing today.
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Benny teaches swing violin and give workshops.
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