lit a candle 8h agoMy father played Paris Musette on Sunday mornings in our kitchen in Alabama, the accordion part always his favourite, and I never knew the player's name until today. 79 years old. Strange to grieve a voice you only just learned belonged to someone.
Their story
Jacques Bolognesi was a French jazz musician who played trombone, piano and accordion with equal command, and who became one of the most sought-after instrumentalists in Paris across five decades. Known to colleagues as "Bolo", he worked with Martial Solal, Michel Legrand and the Orchestre National de Jazz, and helped…
Jacques Bolognesi was a French jazz musician who played trombone, piano and accordion with equal command, and who became one of the most sought-after instrumentalists in Paris across five decades. Known to colleagues as "Bolo", he worked with Martial Solal, Michel Legrand and the Orchestre National de Jazz, and helped bring the accordion back into jazz. His death, at the age of 79, was announced on 1 November 2026.
He was born on 6 January 1947 in Gap, in the Hautes-Alpes. He taught himself the accordion as a small child in his father's shoemaker's workshop, starting at about the age of five, then took classical piano lessons with the concert pianist Madeleine de Valmalete and studied piano at the conservatoire in Grenoble. He discovered the trombone at thirteen and went on to study it at the Conservatoire national superieur de musique in Paris, graduating with a first prize in 1969. While a student he earned his living in the orchestra of the Moulin Rouge.
His band career took him through the groups of Claude Cagnasso, Eddy Louiss and Ivan Jullien, Hal Singer, Claude Bolling, Martial Solal, Henri Salvador, Michel Legrand and Sacha Distel. In 1987 Antoine Herve brought him into the Orchestre National de Jazz, where he was featured on accordion. He took part in the 1990 compilation Paris Musette, led the big band Caravanserail, worked for many years with Francis Varis in duo, trio and quintet, and played in Francois Lindemann's Piano Seven. From 2004 he led Accordeons et d'ailleurs, a group of seven Parisian accordionists, and in 2007 released Hermetotico with his trio alongside the guitarist Marc Fosset.
He was also a prolific studio musician. He appeared on recordings by Elton John, Paul Simon, Cesaria Evora, France Gall, Magma, Manu Dibango, Francoise Hardy, Papa Wemba, Alpha Blondy and Karlheinz Stockhausen, and composed for artists including Henri Guedon and Marc Steckar.
TSF Jazz reported on 1 November 2026, citing a tribute in Jazz Magazine by Franck Bergerot, that he had died aged 79. German Wikipedia records the date of death as 31 October 2026. The cause of death has not been made public. He is remembered as a rare musician who moved between brass, keyboard and bellows with the same ease, and whose sound runs through decades of French jazz and popular recordings.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and TSF Jazz.
Photos
1Jacques Bolognesi in 2004
by People Forever
Paris Musette brought the accordion back into fashion, your dad had good ears