[Jazz] 38 manuscrits et 43 tapuscrits formant l'ensemble des 45 chroniques de Boris Vian sur le Jazz à Paris pour la radio américaine WNEW

38 manuscripts and 43 typescripts, comprising Boris Vian's 45 chronicles on Jazz in Paris for the American radio station WNEW

“This is Boris Vian saying “Bonjour” from Paris...”

An exceptional complete set of Boris Vian's chronicles on French Jazz in the 1930s and '40s for the American radio station WNEW.

The autograph manuscript of 38 broadcasts written on blank or squared paper and occasionally on headed paper from the Centrale and the Office professionnel des industries et des commerces du papier et du carton. Numerous deletions and corrections throughout, some marginal drawings. All the manuscriptssave two are accompanied by their typescript. The seven other chronicles survive here in typescript only.

All the chronicles are written in English, with the exception of the first six pages which are in French. The manuscripts, all in Boris Vian's hand and in his picturesque and amusing style, have only the parts spoken by the writer during the recordings. As for the typescripts, they contain the complete chronicles, including the parts of the other speakers (Bob Langley, Ben Smith and Bob Carrier) and have annotations by Boris or his American collaborator Ned Brandt.
An important working file chronicling the rapid growth of jazz in France, by one of its practitioners and greatest promoters: the americanophile Boris Vian.
These chronicles were recorded between April 1948 and July 1949 by Radiodiffusion française to be re-broadcast in the US on National Public Radio WNEW in New York. The recordings themselves seem to be definitively lost; we can find no trace of them either in France or in the States. They were only published in written form – derived from the set here presented for sale – in 1997, under the title Jazz in Paris.
This series of broadcasts was supposed to present French jazz, as made and recorded from the 1930s and '40s to an American audience. Each chronicle, about 15 minutes in length, was constructed in the same way: an introduction to a band or musician, cut with musical jazz interludes. “Despite these efforts at promotion, the broadcast ran aground after a year. They had already asked Vian to reduce the amount of words in favor of the music (see no. 9), before the program was abruptly cancelled without its primary participant really having been prepared for it.” (Gilbert Pestureau)
A real promoter of jazz and himself a player of the “trompinette”, Boris Vian published many music columns in newspapers and magazines from 1946 on. The brief from WNEW was no small affair for him: he had learned English late in life and was above all a translator. Taking his job very much to heart, he was nonetheless able to come up with chronicles that were at the same time informa
tive, (because very well researched), but also tremendously poetic and funny.

Boris Vian's commitment went beyond the simple musical element, as Gilbert Pestureau points out in his introduction to Jazz in Paris: “Vian insisted on the fashion for, and importance in France
of, 'mixed' groups of jazzmen at a time when there was still segregation in the United States: 'this is Boris Vian saying bonjour from Paris and bringing you more and more French hot recordings made by various conglomerations of black and white musicians'”. (Chronicle n°38, 'Sidney Bechet')

Provenance: Fondation Vian.


Details of the archive:
Pilot: "Radiodiffusion française presents ‘Hot Club de Paris'": 6 ll. autograph and 1 covering leaf with a small drawing.
N°2 - "Philippe Brun": 3 mss. pp. on one leaf / 3 pages typescript / 2 pp. typescript of French translation
N°4 - "Alix Combelle": 3 pp. typescript.
N°5 - "André Ekyan”: 3 pp. manuscript on 2 leaves of squared paper / 3 typescript pp.
N°6 - “Léo Chauliac”: 3 pp. manuscript on a double squared leaf / 3 pp. manuscript on 2 squared leaves (replacing the usual typescript)
N°7 - “Hubert Rostaing”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 3 pp.typescript
N°8 - “André Barelli”: 4 pp. manuscript on a double squared leaf / 3 pp. typescript
N°9 - “Quintet of the H.C.F. [Hot Club de France]”: 2 pp. manuscript on a squared leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°10 - “Claude Luter”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°11 - “Jack Diéval”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°12 - “Michel de Villers”: 2 pp. manuscript on a copy of a paper from the Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures / 2 pp. typescript
N°13 - “Hubert Fol”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 leaf of glacé paper/ 2 pp. typescript
N°14 - "André Persiany”: 3 pp. typescript with a large drawing to verso of one leaf
N°15 - “Hubert Rostaing”: 3 pp. typescript
N°16 - “Claude Bolling”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 3 pp. typescript
N°17 - “Jack Diéval”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 3 pp. typescript
N°18 - “Tony Proteau”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 blank leaf / 3 pp. typescript with a marginal drawing and a drawing at end
N°19 - “Eddy Bernard”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°20 - “Gustave Viseur”: 2 pp. manuscript on one leaf of headed paper from the Office professionnel des industries et des commerces du papier et du carton / 3 pp. typescript
N°21 - “Chico Cristobal”: 2 pp. manuscript on one leaf of headed paper from the l'Office professionnel des industries et des commerces du papier et du carton / 3 pp. typescript
N°22 - “College Rythm”: 2 pp. manuscript on one leaf of headed paper from the l'Office professionnel des industries et des commerces du papier et du carton / 3 pp. typescript
N°23 - “[André] Barelli”: 2 pp. manuscript on one leaf of headed paper from the l'Office professionnel des industries et des commerces du papier et du carton / 3 pp. typescript
N°24 - “Claude Luter”: 2 pp. typescript
N°25 - “Be Bop Ministrels”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°26 - “Hubert Rostaing Trio”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°27 - “Jerry Mengo”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 2 copies of 2 pp. typescript
N°28 - “Emile Stern”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / 2 copies of 2 pp. typescript
N°29 - “Django [Reinhardt] and [Claude] Luter”: 2 pp. manuscript on 1 squared leaf / two copies of 2 pp. typescript
N°30 & 31 - “Don Byas”& “Tyree Glenn”: 4 pp. manuscript on a double squared leaf / 4 pp. typescript on headed paper from Radiodiffusion française
N°32 - “Bill Coleman”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript on headed paper from Radiodiffusion française
N°33 - “Don Byas”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 3 pp. typescript with a marginal drawing on headed paper from Radiodiffusion française
N°34 - “Freddy Johnson”: 2 pp. manuscript on one leaf of an account book / 2 pp. typescript on headed paper from Radiodiffusion française
N°35 - “Dicky Wells”: 2 pp. manuscript on one leaf of an account book / 2 pp. typescript on headed paper from Radiodiffusion française
N°36 - “Claude Bolling”: 3 pp. typescript
N°37 - “Eddie South & Stephen Grappelly”: 3 pp. typescript
N°38 - “Sidney Bechet”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 3 pp. typescript
N°39 - “Don Byas”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°40 - “[Hubert] Rostaig - [Bernard] Peiffer”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 3 pp. typescript
N°41 - “Bill Coleman”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°42 - “Claude Bolling”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°43 - “Pierre Braslavsky”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript with several pencil drawings to head
N°44 - “Hubert Rostaing”: 2 pp. manuscript on one blank leaf / 2 pp. typescript
N°45 - “Claude Luter”: 2 pp. manuscript on two blank leaves / 2 pp. typescript