Jon Larsen


Jon Larsen is a gypsy jazz guitarist, record producer, painter, and amateur scientific researcher. He is the founder of the group Hot Club de Norvège. In 2007 he received the Buddy Award for his lifelong contribution to jazz.

Career

When he was in his early teens, he learned rock and soul songs on an acoustic steel-string guitar. Through friends, he learned about blues, jazz, flamenco, and classical guitar. After he heard "Tears" by Django Reinhardt on the radio, he decided that this is how he wanted his guitar to sound. At seventeen he formed a string trio and had his first professional job.
In the 1970s, Larsen worked mainly as a painter. He started the Hot Club de Norvege in 1980 with guitarists Per Frydenlund and bassist Svein Aarbostad. They had a hit record when they performed with pop singer Lillebjørn Nilsen. Larsen started the label Zonic Entertainment to record musicians who have been influenced by Frank Zappa. He has worked with Chet Baker, Philip Catherine, Stéphane Grappelli, Warne Marsh, Biréli Lagrène, Babik Reinhardt and Jimmy Rosenberg. He has produced more than 450 jazz records for the label he founded, Hot Club Records.
He has led a group of musicians who played with Zappa, including Arthur Barrow, Jimmy Carl Black, Bruce Fowler, Bunk Gardner, Tommy Mars, and Don Preston. They recorded the album Strange News from Mars.
Symphonic Django was released in 2008 by Storm Films, which also produced a documentary about Larsen and guitar virtuoso Jimmy Rosenberg titled Jon & Jimmy. In 2012, the documentary won the Dutch Edison Award.
After eight years of research, his book on cosmic dust in urban environments – In Search of Stardust: Amazing Micro-Meteorites and Their Terrestrial Imposters – was published in 2017.

Discography

As leader

With Hot Club de Norvege