THE HOT CLUB OF SAN FRANCISCO

Mandolin, Acoustic Jazz Guitar

United States

Paul Mehling (Dupont MD-50, Modele Selmer Guitar) is the founder of The Hot Club of San Francisco.  He began playing the guitar at the age of six.  Early on in school, Paul studied the bass and by age 16, he began violin lessons and was self-taught on the mandolin, tenor, and plectrum banjos.  Influenced by The Beatles and his mother’s jazz records of Django Reinhardt, Louis Armstrong and Sidney Bechet, Paul decided to take his passion to the next level, and began studying jazz improv with trumpeter/educator Ray Brown.  With this musical melting pot laying the foundation, it was only natural that Paul would make music his life.

Paul’s desire led him throughout the United States and Europe, where he found himself improvising on the streets.  In his 20’s, he was a member of several bands, including the Hot Club of Friends, The Magnolia Jazz Band, and Jake Stock and the Abalone Stompers.  Paul has since performed and played with swing practitioners, Serge Krief, Dan Hicks and the Acoustic Warriors, Maria Muldaur, John Jorgenson, Pearl Django, David Grisman, Howard Alden, Florin Niculescu, Christophe Lartilleux, Gonzalo Bergara, Angelo Debarre, Robin Nolan, and Bireli Lagrene to name a few. He has also made several television and radio appearances, most notably with the Jim Cullum Jazz Band on their syndicated radio show, “Riverwalk, Live From The Landing.” In the fall of 2003, he performed as an international guest artist for the First Annual Gypsy-Jazz Festival in New Caledonia.  He has also served as co-producer of DjangoFest SF, a San Francisco Bay Area festival dedicated to gypsy jazz.

In 1991, Paul went out on his own and formed The Hot Club of San Francisco, which released its first CD in 1992, entitled, “QHCSF”.  Since then, Paul and the Hot Club have released 13 CDs on various labels, five of which were produced by Paul.  The group has been presented by the San Francisco Jazz Festival, the Monterey Jazz Festival, Lincoln Center in New York, the Sacramento Jazz Jubilee, Festival de Jazz in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and the Festivals du Django Reinhardt in Samois-sur-Seine, France and Akureyri, Iceland.

Paul has produced five volumes of an instructional video series for Homespun Tapes titled, “How to play Django Style Gypsy Jazz Guitar,” a project which was begun in 1997.  He also enjoys occasional collaborations with his wife, dancer/choreographer Kerry Mehling, and her company, “Talismanic Physical Theater.”

Evan Price (Violin , melodica) Evan Price is steadily becoming one of the most respected jazz violinists of his generation. A native of Detroit, MI, his musical background includes some earnest dues-paying in a variety of genres. As a young competitive fiddler he won his share of awards, having been named the U.S. Scottish Fiddling Champion, Canadian Junior Fiddle Champion, and Canadian Novelty Fiddling Champion. He also performed with some of the masters of fiddle lore—Stephane Grappelli, Johnny Frigo, Claude “Fiddler” Williams, Johnny Gimble, Buddy Spicher, and Vassar Clements—as well as a diverse array of pop icons from Stevie Wonder and Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page and Robert Plant to comedian, Steven Wright.Evan’s college career included stints at both The Cleveland Institute of Music and at Berklee College of Music, and has himself served as a member of the music faculty at Wellesley College.

Evan is a ten-year veteran of the world-renowned, paradigm-shifting jazz ensemble, the Turtle Island Quartet. During his tenure in Turtle Island, Evan gave over five hundred performances in concert venues from Latvia to Australia and had the opportunity to collaborate with many musical luminaries, such as Cuban clarinetist Paquito D’Rivera, and pianists Dr. Billy Taylor and Kenny Barron. He recorded five CD’s with Turtle Island, two of which—“Four + 4” and “A Love Supreme: The Legacy of John Coltrane”—received GRAMMY® awards in 2006 and 2008 in the Classical Crossover category.

Since 1998, Evan has been proud to call himself a member of The Hot Club of San Francisco, perhaps the most venerable gypsy jazz band in the US. During his tenure, the group has thrilled audiences from Iceland to Mexico and across the United States, and has released six CD’s which feature Evan on violin.An accomplished composer, Evan has contributed compositions and arrangements to the repertoires of HCSF, Turtle Island Quartet, Quartet San Francisco, Orchestra Nashville, The San Francisco Girls’ Chorus, and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. He lives in San Rafael, CA, with his wife and daughter.

Jordan Samuels (rhythm guitar) Jordan Samuels is an accomplished guitarist who has been studying, performing and teaching throughout the San Francisco Bay Area for the last twenty years. While at San Francisco State University, he completed his formal training in music composition under the guidance of Ronald Caltabiano and Richard Festinger while simultaneously pursuing a jazz studies curriculum directed by Andrew Speight and John Calloway. Since completing his studies in 2010, Samuels has become an in-demand jazz guitarist and can be seen performing regularly with the Hot Club of San Francisco, Erik Jekabson’s Electric Squeezbox Orchestra, and his own trio Certified Organic. He has also appeared with Doug Martin, Paula West, Wil Blades, Smith Dobson, Adam Theis, Matt Clark and Bobby Watson among many others.

Christophe Carington (rhythm guitar) is a San Francisco based American gypsy jazz guitarist, composer, and arranger - mixing the sounds of gypsy jazz with funk, fusion, and video game music, to forge his own style of progressive guitar playing.He began playing violin at the age of 9, but quickly fell in love with guitar a few years later at age 13, studying both for many years to come. However, in 2014 at the age of 24, Christophe arrived in Paris where he discovered gypsy jazz for the first time. Christophe has toured and recorded with many American artists such as Dig the Kid, Willie G, The West Coast Blues Society’s Caravan of All-Stars, and many more. He is currently working on his first solo album, which will be released in 2023.

Dexter Williams (String Bass) Dexter Williams is an up-and-coming young bassist who has spent his life immersed in the jazz community. Even in utero, he was being serenaded by the irreverent stylings of his parents’ popular group, the Wooden Nickel Jass Band.Taking to music quickly, starting out on violin at the age of five, he became interested in other instruments such as guitar, clarinet, and piano until in his first year of high school, he picked up the upright bass to play in the concert band. The next summer, he attended the Teagarden Traditional Jazz Camp in Sly Park and fell in love with the sound and culture of traditional jazz.

Throughout high school he focused on upright bass and began his career as a jazz musician. Starting out in The New Traditionalists Youth Band, Dexter began playing professionally with musicians such as John Cocuzzi, Danny Coots, Jeff Barnhart, John Reynolds, Jim Buchman, Hal Smith, and many others. His playing has been described as highly lyrical, and heavily influenced by traditional and swing styles.

America’s Finest & Longest Running gypsy jazz band.