Sidney Bechet
May 22, 2022 Leave a comment
How do you heal after the worst war in history? You find someone who makes music that you can climb into and disappear. In 1949, that person in France was Sidney Bechet, the New Orleans-born and bred saxophonist (among other instruments). He had returned to a Europe that he knew well, having first arrived with jazz bands in the mid-1920s, accompanied by celebrities such as the dancer Josephine Baker. He was in the thick of les années folles, the crazy years, as the French call it. He blew up a storm on his saxophone from Paris to Russia.
I was wandering around in the park in Juan Les Pins, in sight of the jazz arena where the annual jazz festival takes place, when I saw the statue of Sidney Bechet. His memory is honoured as he was one of the chief figures to put the town on the jazz map with a festival that has become world famous. I quote Michael Nelson’s appreciative words:
“In 1950 he (Bechet) went down to Juan-Les-Pins to play at the Riviera version of the Paris Vieux Colombier nightclub; the beginning of a long love affair with Juan-Les-Pins, where he played every year until his death in 1959. It was on the Riviera that he made his biggest impact when he married in Antibes a German, Elizabeth Ziegler.
“Thousands turned out to cheer the wedding procession from the Place Nationale to the town hall in Antibes … Scores of doves were released as the couple left the town hall. The procession of floats and jazz bands was half a mile long and included a 12-foot model of a soprano saxophone carried by two attendants. Thirteen gallons of rum were dispensed to warm up the crowd. So memorable was that wedding that Bechet’s statue has pride of place in Juan-Les-Pins.”
His style of playing has been called “emotional, reckless, and large” (Wikipedia). He predated Louis Armstrong in solo saxophone playing, and made a mark on jazz that will not be erased.
Others who followed Sidney Bechet in making Juan-Les-Pins a world venue for jazz – Chick Corea; Stéphane Grapelli
The Jazz Arena
© Will
http://www.willwilltravel.wordpress.com
Les Semboules, Antibes
April, 2022
Source: Michael Nelson: The French Riviera A History. Matador, 2017.
Photograph of Bechet – Wikipedia
My photographs, published by RotsWolk Publishers
A traffic circle in Juan-Les-Pins