Antwerpse Jazzclub | |
_(13_September_2016).png) The logo of the Antwerp Jazz Club, as retrieved in 2016. The logo depicts the abbreviation of the club (AJC), while asaxophone takes on the shape of the middle letter "J". | |
.jpg){kind=logo} A sculpture resembling the logo of the Antwerp Jazz Club, attached to the front of the foldable wooden screen covering the presenter's area, present during the jazz club's Tuesday-evening sessions in its clubhouse (13 September 2016). | |
| Named after | The city ofAntwerp |
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| Formation | 1938; 87 years ago (1938),[1] making it one of the oldest still existingjazz clubs.[2] |
| Founder | Hans Philippi[3] |
| Purpose | "The study and propaganda of the jazz-music, as it was created and played by theAfro-Americans of the United States, by means of the exemplified listening of music- and image recordings, through lectures at third parties about the nature and movements of jazz and, if feasible the organizing of concerts with American jazz musicians."[2] |
| Headquarters | Second floor of[1] Café Den Bengel,Grote Markt 5, 2000Antwerp, Belgium.(Clubhouse)[4][5] |
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| Coordinates | |
Region | Flanders, Belgium |
Key people | |
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TheAntwerp Jazz Club (Dutch:Antwerpse Jazzclub, abbreviatedAJC[7]) is an association inAntwerp, Belgium,[8] founded in 1938[1] by Hans Philippi,[3] which delivers weekly lectures about and presentations ofjazz music,[8] at no cost,[3] open to the public at large. Its sessions are held in Dutch.[4] Other than these sessions, the club organizes concerts,[3] including helping to organizeblues concerts;[3] and has aided in the screenings of jazz documentaries.[9]
Its Tuesday-sessions are held mostly[3] by a member, and if not by another amateur of jazz, and are often illustrated by DVD-recordings.[5] They are held every Tuesday night from 20PM until 22PM,[3] but not during theChristmas period, nor the month of July. On request, the association also organises events about jazz for interested associations.[5]
Thejazz club is a member of:
The now obsolete Dutch-language website Gratisinantwerpen.be, which was supported by the city of Antwerp and listed free events in Antwerp (the website also had a less complete English version at Antwerpforfree.be), used to advertise the weekly Tuesday-sessions of theAJC.[11]
AJC is a subscriber to a number of jazz magazines, from the United States and from several European countries, which can be consulted in its clubhouse.[1]
_at_the_Antwerp_Jazz_Club_(AJC)_(13_September_2016).jpg)
In 1938, the club started as gatherings to listen to commented jazz music, which remains the main activity of the club today (info as of 2016[update]).[3]
Since 1950, the club also started organizing concerts.[3] Among the famous jazz musicians who have performed in Antwerp in the 1950s and 1960s, due to theAJC, are:Willie "The Lion" Smith,Big Bill Broonzy,Earl Hines,Memphis Slim,Buck Clayton,Bill Coleman,Buddy Tate,Ben Webster,Illinois Jacquet,Ray Bryant andGuy Lafitte.[2]
On 28 April 1963 theAJC celebrated itssilver jubilee.[12]
The "Archive of Fons Van Cleempoel" (an archive spanning the years 1968—1988, created by "Amsab - Institute for Social History [nl]", in partnership with the "European Holocaust Research Infrastructure (EHRI)" and the "National Archives of Belgium")[13] entails some documents from theAJC.[14]
On the club's seventy-year jubilee, the club honoured its own history by means of showing its own concert recordings, lengthy documentation and imagery during its Tuesday-sessions.[2]
On 18 August 2016, the Antwerp cinema "Cinema Zuid" (the new name of the Antwerp "Filmmuseum" since 12 September 2009, after it had moved to the Antwerp district "South" in 2004 under theMuseum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp),[15] in collaboration with theAJC, organized a screening of two documentaries about the Belgian jazz musician andconductorStan Brenders and about the jazz guitaristDjango Reinhardt respectively.[9]
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Since 8 November 1994,AJC holds its sessions in a bar called "Den Bengel" in Antwerp.[5]
More precisely, the clubhouse ofAJC is housed in the same building as that bar (which occupies the ground floor), yet on the second floor.[1] The building is actually an oldguild house (Dutch:ambachtshuis) called "Ambachtshuis de Mouwe" (alternative names: "de gulde Mouwe" or "het Cuypershuys"), which is registered and protected as a monument since 2 September 1976 into the Flemish inventory ofimmovable property, part of theheritage registers in Belgium.[16]
The building's ground floor is dated 1579, itsgable is dated 1628. The building was originally the "house" of thecraft ofcooperage (Dutch:kamer van het Kuipersambacht). The architectural style of the building isrenaissance architecture, it was designed by Léonard Blomme, and restored in 1907. The top of the building is crowned with a triangularpediment which holds a gilded statue ofSaint Matthias, thepatron saint of the coopers.[16]
The building is part of the squareGrote Markt.[16] When facing itsfaçade, one finds the buildingBurgerhuis Witten Engel(in Dutch) at its left and the buildingHuis Spaengien(in Dutch) at its right, which are also protected monuments.[17][18]
One of its board members is Piet Van De Craen,[19] a full-time[6] language professor of Dutch Linguistics and of General Linguistics at theVrije Universiteit Brussel,[20] who has been called a major force behind the jazz club. For the occasion of the seventy-year jubilee of theAJC in 2008, Piet Van De Craen published a monograph aboutDuke Ellington (the first ever publication about him in Dutch) which features a concise biography and discography, looks at Ellington as a pianist/composer and at Ellington's co-operation withBilly Strayhorn and "The Ellingtonians" before and after 1943.[2] In the same year, Piet Van De Craen also criticized the lack of references to jazz history in the United States:
The United States doesn't learn anything from the history. Everytime there is a new president, one starts all over again. It is a country where connections are not made. And then it happens that, for example withOscar Peterson, recently died, the press doesn't make any reference toArt Tatum, just as if Peterson arose out of nowhere ... that kind of profundity is lacking.[2]
Hans Philippi (born 17 December 1905) founded both theAJC, as well as theHot Club Basel, a jazz club inBasel, Switzerland. He was an early advocate of the recognition of jazz as an art. He had his own radio series, held jazz music presentations by means of playing sound records throughout Switzerland and was acquainted with jazz musicians such asLouis Armstrong and jazz experts such asHugues Panassié andCharles Delaunay.[21]
The Swiss jazz musician Mario Schneeberger compiled a list of notable documents regarding Hans Philippi, from the memorial albums of Philippi, after an acquaintance of Schneeberger had told him that they were about to be put up as garbage disposal following a house clearance in February 2004.[21]
In this archive by Mario Schneeberger, it is noted that Hans Philippi was president of theAJC in 1938, as from a booklet of that year produced by theAJC called "Jazz-Leven".[12]
The activities of the club were coordinated by Louis Vaes (1920—1998) from 1946 until 1998.
Later, his brother François Vaes (born 1939), nicknamed "Sus",[7] became president of the club,[3] until he died after a "short disease" on 9 August 2012. François Vaes advocated for youths to appreciate the roots of jazz, as opposed to being seemingly merely interested in new or trendy jazz music.[7]
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