Champagne Lovers Band

You do not win over an audience on the Charles Bridge by playing loudly. Anyone performing there amid streams of tourists, statues and the wind from the Vltava has to make people stop and listen, and the Champagne Lovers Band has learned that lesson. It was founded in 2016 in Prague as a street quintet, first on Old Town Square and later on the famous bridge.

This background explains a characteristic the band has retained: it prefers to play acoustically, without amplification or with only a small sound system for the vocals. This preserves the full dynamic range of the instruments. The trumpet can whisper before opening up, the clarinet can sink into its lower register, and the audience hears the double bass as wood and string.

The lineup does without trombone, banjo and drums. Instead, guitar, double bass and washboard carry the rhythm, creating a sound that recalls the small chamber ensembles of the swing era. On the band's self-titled album, Jiří Patócs plays trumpet, Tomáš Černý clarinet, Pavel Seredenko guitar, Aleš Sládek washboard and Jan Velek, who also sings in addition to playing double bass.

The repertoire focuses on sung standards, both well-known and less familiar. Alongside „When You're Smiling“ and „Blueberry Hill“ are pieces such as „Ice Cream“, „Doctor Jazz“, „I Found A New Baby“ and „Somebody Stole My Girl“. The Dixieland festival in Pilsen introduced the Prague group as the most romantic traditional jazz band in the Czech Republic and described their range as stretching from Armstrong to Parker. In fact, the band draws little distinction between Dixieland, swing and early bebop. What matters is interplay, room for solos and a focused calm more often associated with a jazz club.

The band found just such a club in Prague. At Jazz Dock on the Smíchov bank of the Vltava, it is one of the regular guests in the Nedělní Dixie series, the Sunday afternoon Dixieland session.

Even so, the band learned its craft in the open air, and you can hear that in every subtle entrance. Listen closely, and you’ll notice how the guitar slips in the chords almost casually, while the washboard carries the pulse as if the band were still standing on the bridge’s cobblestones.