Charlotte Reinhardt is a pianist, composer, producer and great-niece of the famous Django Reinhardt. It was his gypsy mother, a renowned piano teacher, who gave him the desire to start playing the classical piano and then to make it his passion. After studying at the Paris Conservatory, she was solicited by many artists such as Andrea Bocelli, Laurent Voulzy, Frédéric Couderc, Roberto Alagna, Coline Serreau, Benoît Jacquot.
She just released a new album: colors. 12 short, mysterious, lyrical, contemplative pieces. Improvisations around the piano.
franceinfo: colors is a very intimate album, it’s a Dsurgingbut at the same time, there is a return to the origins.
Charlotte Reinhardt: Yes. There is a return to origins which is really due to confinement. We were, all the same, cut off from all temporality, we had no more appointments, nothing more to deliver, no more deadlines. It allowed an immense freedom of creation and it is what happened for my “colors“, where I was in front of my piano and I started working on pieces that I liked. I didn’t really have time to work on classical, for example, and that allowed me to compose late at night and feeling free, without any record purpose, so it was very intimate.
This album colors is also a way of paying homage to these artists, authors, composers, talented musicians who rocked you, accompanied you in all this classical piano work, we think of Maurice Ravel or Claude Debussy. And then when one evokes, one quotes the name of Reinhardt, there are two things which immediately occur. It is, on the one hand, the talent of the musician that he was and above all of what he left behind and still continues today and, on the other hand, the image of freedom. Did your mother pass this freedom on to you?
Completely. It’s a pretty crazy story, actually, because I was brought up in classical music. My mom played the piano and I fell asleep with Bach and loved it. I was singing, for me it was swinging. My stepfather is a jazz guitarist, so there was already a clash of cultures. It opened a huge door for me. And belatedly, I met my grandmother, my mother had not been brought up by her, and when I found my gypsy grandmother, everything woke up in me.
Discovering this filiation with Django Reinhardt allowed me to understand a lot of things about my background, my desires.
Charlotte Reinhardtat franceinfo
Your instinct too since confinement has allowed you to rediscover this instinct that you were hiding a little.
Yes. Which, in addition, was a little locked in by this classic culture, which has always been there so very deeply rooted. All of these worlds exploded a bit by allowing me this great freedom.
You started with the Paris Conservatory and then quickly, there were the jazz cellars, the concert halls. Does that mean that the scene was what interested you the most?
Not at all. The scene took a long time. It is thanks to Laurent Voulzy. I made him listen to my compositions because I have been composing since I was little. I made my first compositions, I was 13 years old, but I kept them for me, I was happy. And on a train, Laurent Voulzy said to me: “But it’s not your voice that I hear!“And it’s true that I was blackmailing my actor friends and he said to me:”You have to sing your compositions, your songs” and it was a long job for me to get off the piano to put the voice forward.
My voice was my piano and I was hidden behind it.
Charlotte Reinhardtat franceinfo
And then I launched myself on stage afterwards and it was painful, but then so extraordinary. The stage is another creation. When you overcome your fears, it’s extraordinary!
How was the piece built Mess ?
It’s a piece that is very strong for me. There was a cycle like that, a kind of loop that I played almost obsessively. And it was an encounter with dancers from the Opera that suddenly made me want to break this cycle which was finally order. I added a battery that just put the mess. It’s a kind of duet where the piano and the drums will bicker, the drums will take over, but the piano will not decline at all from the beginning to the end with this hypnotic cycle that I love to play. There will be a beautiful clip with flamenco dancers that will give this energy and this homecoming.
Does it feel good to go back to basics?
Yes. I liked the previous album a lot, but there was something in the making that wasn’t fully matured, fully assumed. And this one, I say to myself: it’s me. When I listen to it, I’m happy. I recognize myself and that is essential. Yes, there is something essential.