Olivier Franc's Paris Swing Connection

In 2009, Olivier Franc performed in Marciac as part of a sextet with Wynton Marsalis and Bob Wilber; he returned there in 2022 alongside Marsalis. The invitations were extended to a musician whom French critics have considered Sidney Bechet's legitimate heir for decades.

Franc grew up with this music. His father, René Franc, was a clarinetist in the orchestras of Pierre Braslavsky and André Réwéliotty, with whom Bechet performed during his years in France. Olivier, born in 1953, began playing jazz in the early 1970s and founded his own group in 1976. Three years later, the Académie du Jazz awarded him the Prix Sidney Bechet, and the Hot Club de France honored him in 1997 for the album Swing Folies and in 2012 for Ellington Mood.

Since 2006, he has been playing Bechet's own soprano saxophone. The instrument had been auctioned off, a Swiss enthusiast acquired it, and entrusted it to Franc. One immediately hears why: the tone has body extending into the lower register, the vibrato resonates freely, and the phrases unfold with the drama that makes Bechet's recordings so distinctive. Franc doesn't simply copy solos. He writes his own pieces in this style and places them alongside "Petite Fleur" or Bechet's interpretation of "Summertime."

His son, Jean-Baptiste Franc, plays piano in the quintet. He plays stride with a powerful left hand, trained in the styles of James P. Johnson and Donald Lambert, providing a foundation for the soprano that doesn't require a banjo. The trombone of Benoît de Flamesnil, a longtime collaborator, responds with melodic counterpoints, inspired by masters of the 1930s and 40s such as Vic Dickenson. Double bass and drums keep the swing loose, light, and danceable.

The Franc family has left its mark on Dresden. René and Olivier appeared several times at the Dixieland Festival, and for the 30th festival they even performed together. Later, Olivier’s Bechet band played at the Dresdner Opernhaus; appearances at Lincoln Center and Symphony Space in New York, as well as at the Olympia in Paris and the Victoria Hall in Geneva, are also part of the ensemble’s history. With Jean-Baptiste at the piano, the third generation is now on board, and the sound of Bechet’s instrument lives on.