(b Paris, 26 Jan 1908; d Paris, 1 Dec 1997). French jazz violinist. Largely self-taught as a violinist and pianist, he studied formally only from 1924 to 1928. After playing both the piano and the violin in silent movie theatres and dance bands he worked in jazz professionally from around 1927. With Django Reinhardt he was the principal member of the Quintette du Hot Club de France (formed 1934), the unusual instrumentation of which consisted of a violin, three guitars and a double bass; through its many recordings (notably Dinah, 1934, Ultraphon, and Them There Eyes, 1938, Decca) the group became well known in Europe and the USA (for illustration of Grappelli with Reinhardt, see Violin, fig.17). In 1939 Grappelli left the quintet and moved to England, where he was long associated with George Shearing; he worked again with Reinhardt in London (1946) and, after returning to France in 1946, in Paris (19478) and Rome (1949). During the following years he became progressively less active as a leader, but in the 1960s his career was revived by a growing interest in the jazz violin, and in particular by the success of the album Violin Summit (1966, Saba). He visited the USA to perform at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1969 and in 1973 received an unusual amount of attention for his first album with the classical violinist Yehudi Menuhin; others followed in 1975 and 1977. Around the same time he performed, recorded and appeared at festivals with such diverse musicians as Joe Venuti (1969), Gary Burton (1969), Earl Hines (1974), Philip Catherine (1979), the mandolin player David Grisman (1979) and Martial Solal (1980). He remained active in the 1990s.
With Venuti, Eddie South and Stuff Smith, Grappelli was a pioneer of the jazz violin. Although his playing in the Quintette du Hot Club de France tended to be overshadowed by that of Reinhardt, who was the greater innovator, he broadened his style throughout his long career and played with greater authority in his later years; still his playing remained rooted in the swing idiom and continued to be characterized by his sweet tone. He was important in furthering the careers of Jean-Luc Ponty and Didier Lockwood, and his recordings with Menuhin brought new recognition to the violin as a jazz instrument. He occasionally played piano in a style indebted to that of Bix Beiderbecke.
Django and I had the First Three-guitar Group without Electricity!, Says Jazz Violin Virtuoso Stephane Grappelli, Crescendo International, ix/4 (197071), 267
M. Glaser and S. Grappelli: Jazz Violin (New York, 1981) [incl. interview, transcrs.]
L. Jeske: Stephane Grappelli: Fiddler Fantastique, Down Beat, xlviii (1981), no.4, pp.1518, 645; no.5, pp.1821, 55 [incl. discography]
R. Horricks: Stephane Grappelli or The Violin with Wings: a Profile (Tunbridge Wells, 1983) [incl. discography]
S. Stern: From Silent Movies to CDs, Down Beat, lix/8 (1992), 289
S. Grappelli, J. Oldenhove and J.M. Bramy: Mon violon pour tout bagage: mιmoires (Paris, 1992)
J. BRADFORD ROBINSON