Person

Bordin, Gino

1899-1977

Born in Vicenza, Italy, Gino Borodin became a master of the steel guitar, soon after moving to Paris in 1926. He has been called “the Parisian wizard of the Hawaian guitar” -- a method of playing the six-string guitar flat on his lap, playing with the left hand, sliding a piece of metal or glass along the strings. His career took off in 1927/1928 and he recorded and composed hundred of 78 records. He founded the Orchestre Otto and the Orchestre Hawaien Gino Bordin (the name he took in France). In concerts and radio appearances, sometimes with his wife Margot Pépin (also a guitar player), he played jazz and even African-style music with his Hawaian guitar. His career seems to have faded after the war -- he was taught guitar students at his home on Rue Adran in Paris and at private schools. In Patrick Modiano’s 1982 novel, “De si braves garçons,” he appears as a character as his real rather than fictional self. In 2012, a bilingual (French and English) plaque was installed on the outside wall of his former home in Paris.