COYLE — It was a momentous day when young Ranger heard Quintette du Hot Club de France, the original band of Gypsy-jazz men.
With Django Reinhardt on guitar and Stephane Grappelli on violin, their recordings from the 1930s wowed this boy, a Bainbridge Islander descended from Sicilian immigrants.
Ranger Sciacca has been on the Gypsy jazz journey for a good while now.
He’s leader of Ranger and the Re-Arrangers, one of the Seattle area’s hot-club outfits, and he’s bringing his beloved sound to rural Jefferson County this Sunday afternoon.
Admission is by donation and all ages are welcome at the 3 p.m. show, an unusual one in the Concerts in the Woods series at the Laurel B. Johnson Community Center, 923 Hazel Point Road.
Instead of the folk and bluegrass often heard in the snug center, the Re-Arrangers will bring the swing, the Gypsy melodies and of course, Sciacca says, “we’ll do a couple songs as fast as we can and see what happens.”
Hot-club jazz is “really fun, joyful music,” so he and the band strive to bring the audience fully into it.
As Reinhardt and Grappelli taught him, “it’s about the feeling you put into the music.”
Family members
Ranger and the Re-Arrangers are otherwise out of the ordinary in that the leader’s father plays rhythm guitar for the band.
Michael Sciacca and his son formed the Re-Arrangers in 2006 after returning from the Django Reinhardt festival in Samois-sur-Seine, France.
They have released three albums and played more than 500 shows — father and son carrying on the bent of their forebears, those Sicilians who came to New York City and played jazz around the turn of the 20th century.
Completing the Re-Arrangers this Sunday are bassist Neil Conaty and percussionist Jeffrey Moose, who also happens to be director of the Jeffrey Moose Gallery of art in Seattle.
Together they will turn the community center into a version of a Paris cafe — with host Norm Johnson’s complimentary coffee and cookies served at intermission.
To find out more about the band and hear song samples, see www.rangerswings.com, and for information about the venue and concert series, visit www.coyleconcerts.com.
For directions to the community center and other details, Johnson is the contact at 360-765-3449 or johnson5485@msn.com.
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Features Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5062, or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
