was born on this date in 1910. Reinhardt was the first hugely influential jazz figure to emerge from Europe — and he remains possibly the most influential European to this day. Play Jazz Guitar.com has some interesting background.
A violinist first and a guitarist later, Jean Baptiste “Django” Reinhardt grew up in a gypsy camp near Paris where he absorbed the gypsy strain into his music. A disastrous caravan fire in 1928 badly burned his left hand, depriving him of the use of the fourth and fifth fingers, but the resourceful Reinhardt figured out a novel fingering system to get around the problem that probably accounts for some of the originality of his style. According to one story, during his recovery period, Reinhardt was introduced to American jazz when he found a 78 RPM disc of Louis Armstrong’s “Dallas Blues” at an Orleans flea market. He then resumed his career playing in Parisian cafes until one day in 1934 when Hot Club chief Pierre Nourry proposed the idea of an all-string band to Reinhardt and Grappelli. Thus was born the Quintet of the Hot Club of France, which quickly became an international draw thanks to a long, splendid series of Ultraphone, Decca and HMV recordings.
The Red Hot Jazz Archive has some on-line recordings of the Quintette of the Hot Club of France.