Shanghai Jazz Divas

Note to self : Like all furry gremlin creatures, do not bring the boyfriend out to jazz bars after midnight.


Or at least something close to midnight.

As China's coolest and most cosmopolitan place to hang back in her heyday, Shanghai experienced a jazz boom during the 1930s and 1940s and was the undisputed jazz capital of Asia. After all jazz was the perfect complement to the dissolute, opium-tinged Mafia underworld of the period with dance hall hostesses, emerging crime bosses and foreign devils sharing the stage.

The turbulent years that followed however saw a decline with the closure of dance halls and the virtual disappearance of the reputedly western bourgeois music from Shanghai. However with the changing political and social trends, things have started to pick up again with local establishment offering jazz performances to patrons.


Bloody hell. We are lost.
Of course Charming Calvin didn't appreciate being dragged several miles in the dark searching for this mysterious establishment. Unfortunately - let's face it - jazz bars are usually located in such nondescript lil corners. Armed only with a tattered old map, we skulked around the French Concession looking for the hole in the wall. Tree-lined boulevards and avenues with lovely colonial-era townhouses just don't seem as romantic in the dead of night.

Of course it was far creepier to find the shady dive sandwiched between a Hot Pot and a Bon Bon.

I kid you not.

Busty handmaiden clad in a slutty-casual version of the chipao stood at the dark entrance bidding us to enter while offering spirits at a shockingly high premium. Calvin pulled a face. The fact that the stygian interiors of the club was shrouded in a thick fog of cigar smoke didn't exactly help endear the place to him.

But once I saw the stage, I was hooked. Husky-voiced jazz diva on the cosy platform with a dozen or more patrons unhurriedly sipping their preferred brand of moonshine. A Miss Billie Holliday wannabe with a sassy tongue to match.

Though her predominantly Chinese patrons didn't seem to understand the half of what she was saying.

Paul : You look bored. If you wanna leave, we'll sneak out after the next set.
Calvin : *cough* So dark and smoky I doubt they would even notice.
Paul : You gotta be kidding me. Miss Billie over there would probably clobber me dead with her stilettos.

Seriously. Those wicked eyes of witchcraft sussed out every customer scaring the lights out of those who dared leave.


Lemme oil my pipes for a while, ma bebe.
Sultry jazz in a smoky bar in the French Concession. Could it get any more perfect?