Jon Larsen

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Jon Larsen

Jon Larsen, 2008
Background information
Born (1959-01-07) 7 January 1959
Bærum, Norway
Origin  Norway
Genres Jazz
Occupations Musician, composer & painter
Instruments Guitar
Labels Hot Club Records
Associated acts Hot Club de Norvège
Website Official website

Jon Larsen (born 7 January 1959 in Bærum, Norway) is an autodidact guitarist, composer, surrealistic painter, and record producer with heavy influence on the revival of Gypsy jazz worldwide. Founder of the Hot Club de Norvège (1979-), the Django Festival (1980-), Hot Club Records (1982-), Symphonic Django (2005-), Zonic Entertainment (2007-), and Den Gyldne Banan ("The Golden Banana", art book publishing company) (2009-), and the Project Stardust (micrometeorites), in 2010. In 2007 he received the Buddy Award for his lifelong contribution to jazz.[1][2]

Career

Larsen started out as a painter and guitar player, inspired by Salvador Dalí, Django Reinhardt and Frank Zappa. Later he changed to composition, and created numerous crossover projects with jazz/classical ensembles - gypsy jazz groups together with classical string quartets, chamber orchestras and full symphony orchestras. He had his first concerts at the Moldejazz and meet with the Norwegian pioner jazz guitarist Robert Normann, with whom he started work on reissuing his collected recordings, completed 1988.[1][2][3]

He has produced more than 450 jazz records for Hot Club Records, including CDs with Chet Baker, Stephane Grappelli, Warne Marsh, Nappy Brown, Philip Catherine, and most of the prominent Gypsy jazz musicians, like Biréli Lagrène, Jimmy Rosenberg, Andreas Öberg, Angelo Debarre, Florin Nicolescu, Babik Reinhardt, Stochelo Rosenberg, and Adrien Moignard.[1]

In recent years he has been leading the Strange News From Mars project, featuring various Frank Zappa alumni: Tommy Mars, Bruce Fowler, Arthur Barrow, Don Preston, Bunk Gardner, Jimmy Carl Black,[4] etc. He is also working as a producer for the label Zonic Entertainment, exclusively dedicated to music inspired by Zappa.[2]

Documentation on Jon Larsen is to be found on many CDs, DVDs, in books, and films. Symphonic Django was presented (also on DVD) 2008 by Storm Film, who also produced a film documentary about Jon Larsen and the guitar virtuoso Jimmy Rosenberg, Jon & Jimmy (2010, winner of the Dutch Edison Award).[1][2]

Paintings

Jon Larsen started out as a painter, inspired by surrealism, especially Salvador Dalí. He made his debut solo exhibition of pictures as early as April 1976, the same month he had his first gig with the string trio Clo-Z. This was followed by annual exhibitions until 1995, when he started composing music full-time. 1976-78 he received training in drawing by his mentor, the Polish artist Ryszard Warsinski. In 1978 he moved to Barcelona, in order to study Salvador Dalí, and became a part of the Catalán surrealist movement at the time. In 1979 he returned to Norway, and established the jazz quartet, Hot Club de Norvège, but continued to paint full-time. Larsen's paintings are often atmospheric landscapes, filled with stones, mountains and unexpected objects, and are often humorous or whimsical. A book about Jon Larsen's surrealistic pictures, "Maler i solnedgang" (170 pictures, text in Norwegian), was released in May 2009. In 2011 a retrospective exhibition with Jon 42 of Larsen's main works was held in Trondheim and Aalesund.

Discography

Solo works

  • Superstrings - 1992
  • Guitaresque- 1994
  • The Next Step - 2003
  • Short Stories From Catalonia - 2005
  • Live with Vertavo String Quartet - (recorded 1995) - 2006
  • Strange News From Mars - 2007
  • The Jimmy Carl Black Story - 2008[5]
  • A Portrait Of Jon Larsen - 2009[6]
  • Willie Nickerson's Egg (English version, with Tommy Mars) - 2011
  • Willie Nickersons egg (Norwegian version, with Terje Strømdahl and Tommy Mars) - 2013

Within Hot Club de Norvège

  • String Swing - 1981
  • Old, New, Borrowed & Blue - 1982
  • Gloomy - 1984
  • Swing de Paris - 1986
  • La Roue Fleurie (with Angelo Debarre) - 1992
  • Swinging With Jimmy (with Jimmy Rosenberg) - 1994
  • Portrait Of Django (with various French gypsy musicians) - 1995
  • Vertavo (with Vertavo String Quartet) - 1995
  • Hot Shots (with Babik Reinhardt, etc.) - 1997
  • Moreno (with Moreno and Angelo Debarre) - 1998
  • Presenting Ola & Jimmy (with Ola Kvernberg and Jimmy Rosenberg) - 2000
  • Angelo Is Back In Town (with Angelo Debarre) - 2001
  • White Night Stories (with Tromso Symphony Orchestra) - 2002
  • White Night Stories Live - 2002
  • Django's Tiger (with Jimmy Rosenberg and Andreas Öberg) - 2003
  • A Stranger In Town (with Bjørn Vidar Solli) - 2004
  • Hot Cats (with Camelia String Quartet) - 2005
  • Django Music - 2008
  • The Best Of Hot Club de Norvège - 2009
  • Caution HOT! - 2013

Main compositions

  • Jimmy's Suite - 1993
  • Vertavo - 1995
  • White Night Stories - 2002
  • Short Stories From Catalonia (Musique Noir) - 2005
  • Luna Suite - 2006
  • Strange News From Mars - 2007

Film

  • Symphonic Django - Storm Studio - 2007
  • Jon & Jimmy - Storm Studio - 2010. Winner of the Dutch Edison Award 2010.

Honors

  • NOPA's "Composition Of The Year", for Jimmy's Suite - 1993
  • Buddyprisen (for lifelong contribution to jazz) - 2007
  • The Council of Oslo's Artist's Award - 2008
  • The Kardemomme Award (Thorbjorn Egner's legacy) - 2009
  • Audun Tyldens Minnepris (the record producers' award) - 2013

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Lauvland Pettersen, Tomas (2005-12-13). "Jon Larsen Biography". Norsk Biografisk Leksikon. Kunnskapsforlaget. Retrieved 2012-12-02. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 "Jon Larsen Biography". All About Jazz. Retrieved 2012-12-02. 
  3. ↑ "United Mutations". United-Mutations.blogspot.no. Retrieved 2012-12-02. 
  4. ↑ "Jon Larsen on 28-October-2007 recalls working with Jimmy Carl Black just before his death". Archive.org. Retrieved 2012-09-23. 
  5. ↑ "Jon Larsen Review". GandsMusic.com. Retrieved 2012-12-02. 
  6. ↑ Westengen, Rune (2010-01-25). "Jon Larsen: A Portrait of Jon Larsen (Hot Club Records) Review" (in Norwegian). Romerikes Blad. Retrieved 2012-12-02. 

External links

Awards
Preceded by
Paal Nilssen-Love		 Recipient of the Buddyprisen
2007 		Succeeded by
Frode Gjerstad
Authority control
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