Django Reinhardt Case
Essay Preview: Django Reinhardt Case
Report this essay
Django Reinhardt, a gypsy guitarist born in a caravan in a small-town in Belgium in 1910, developed a new category of jazz. The sadness of his music stood in stark contrast to the energetic jubilance of early jazz.
He began playing banjo at the age of 12, picked up guitar at 13, and attained so much skill so rapidly that at the age of 18 he was already highly regarded for his natural skill among the other gypsies. But Django was nothing more than a very skilled player until 1928, when the event occurred that changed his life forever. One night, Django returned home late with a candle to his caravan, which was filled with celloid flowers that his wife had given him. The wick fell out of the candle and ignited the celloid flowers, turning the caravan into an inferno within a matter of seconds. Django and his wife had escaped with their lives, but Django suffered severe burns to half of his body. He nearly lost a leg, and his left hand was severely crippled. Only two of his five fingers could function completely, with his fingers so injured it seemed likely that he would never play the guitar again.
This was the event, however that distinguished Django as a magician. Django refused to give up, at the nursing home where he recuperated for eighteen months; Django practiced everyday, learning how to get around the loss of three fingers. He invented a completely new fingering system to compensate for his loss. All of his innovations in guitar technique can be traced back to his “disability” it set him apart and forced him to try new things and the sound was incredible.
This predicament was inspiring to me and I would go on and on about how he chose to play what he loved threw the controversy of losing three fingers. His motto is ” Greater challenges require greater invention, and the innovation required to do the impossible must come most quickly when presented inflexibly with that impossibility.”