In autumn 2017, trumpeter Jakub Ševčík decided to found a young Dixieland band in Prague. The roots of this idea go back further. Born in Cheb in 1988, Ševčík began learning the trumpet at the music school in Marienbad at the age of seven and played there in Junior Dixieland. At fifteen, he went to the Prague Conservatory. Today he also plays in Petr Kroutil’s Original Vintage Orchestra and performs at the long-established Prague theater Semafor.
The Prague Dixieland Society, called Pražská dixielandová společnost in Czech Republic and PDS for short, gave its first concert at Napa Bar & Gallery in the city center. The venue became the band’s base; it played there once a month and gradually built up an audience. It is now one of the regular guests in the Sunday Dixieland series at Jazz Dock on the Vltava.
Musically, PDS draws on New Orleans jazz from the 1920s and 1930s. Trumpet, clarinet and trombone form the frontline; banjo and sousaphone give the beat its buoyant two-beat pulse, while the drums provide the drive. Improvisation is the foundation, and the classic interplay of the three horns depends on listening closely to one another.
The family core is particularly noteworthy. The siblings Eliška Masáčková and Martin Masáček play trombone and sousaphone, and a female trombonist in the frontline remains rather rare in traditional jazz. Vocals are handled by Petra Ševčíková, with Jakub Douda on clarinet, Jan Brabec on banjo and Petr Mikeš on drums.
The debut album, released in 2020, shows how flexibly the band handles its lineup. A violin and a guitar broaden the sound, and Douda switches between clarinet and tenor saxophone. The track list ranges from the college song “Washington & Lee Swing” via “Ain't Misbehavin'” and “All Of Me” to Gershwin’s “Oh, Lady Be Good”. Several female vocalists share the vocal numbers.
Prague has a long Dixieland history, and the PDS builds on it without sounding nostalgic. The musicians are young, the repertoire is around a hundred years old, and anyone who hears the collective chorus at the end of a piece can tell how much this generation enjoys the old forms.