Hot Club d'Afrique

Hot Club d’Afrique is an all-acoustic Gypsy Jazz quartet originally from Johannesburg, South Africa.

Their music pays tribute to the original “Quintette du Hot Club de France”, founded in 1934 by Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli.

The Hot Club name refers to the Swing jazz of the 1930s, known at the time as ‘hot jazz’, or in France, as ‘le jazz hot’.

Hot Club d’Afrique was founded in Johannesburg in 2008 by husband-and-wife duo Kevin Drummond on guitar,and Theodora Drummond on the piano accordion.

Sharing a mutual love for the music of Django Reinhardt, they formed the first South African Gypsy Jazz band with other local musicians.

The band’s current formation has been performing together since 2012, with Katharina Alexandra Rodriguez-Lopez on double bass and vocals, singing French and English romantic songs of the 1930s and beyond, and Frances van der Walt on violin and rhythm guitar. The newest addition to the band is Chilean guitarist, Nicolás Rodríguez-López.

The band stays true to the sound of the original Hot Club Quintette of the 1930s – foregoing drums, brass, or electric instruments, and emphasising the acoustic, string-based sound typical of Gypsy Jazz. The style is romantic and old-fashioned, and transports the listener to the bygone era of pre-war Paris.

Hot Club d’Afrique has had numerous private and public performances all across South Africa over the past decade, including corporate functions for VW, ABSA, FSACCI, Chamberlain’s and more. They have additionally put on many of their own concerts and theatre-hall music productions. Notable performances include their shows at the Brooklyn Theatre in Pretoria as part of the Gauteng International Arts Festival, the Hilton Arts Festival in Hilton, KZN, as well as shows at Glenshiel and The Sandton Theatre on the Square in Johannesburg.