Behind the lace curtains at Gavroche the windows were steamed up. Glass lamps with flower decals hung over the tables, and orange lamps illuminated the bar. It wasn’t chic. It was comforting, like your mom’s kitchen. It was French. So French it seemed to belong in some faraway corner of Paris.
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Peter Crawford, co-owner of the restaurant, is one-quarter French. He’s also a chef, blues guitarist, cofounder of the nightclub B.L.U.E.S. Etcetera, and comrade of such legends as the late Sunnyland Slim, Jimmy Walker, and Mighty Joe Young. He’s been a fixture on the Chicago blues scene since 1972, the year he moved here from Ann Arbor, Michigan. He’d just graduated from college and got a part-time job at Jazz Record Mart. Soon he was working part-time at Delmark Records–one of the most important independent jazz and blues labels in the U.S.– sweeping floors, filling invoices, answering phones, and collating records. At night he hung out with the blues musicians at Sylvio’s, Theresa’s, and Turner’s. Mighty Joe Young was the first to invite him onstage to play. By 1977 he was playing regular gigs with Walker and Slim. He later recorded with blues mandolinist Yank Rachell and others.
Crawford is modest about his musical achievements. “It’s a very wide-open scene here. If you want to play blues and you sit down and learn how to play stuff, people will invite you up to play with them. They’ll give you a try on jobs. They don’t pay very well, obviously. But if you’re active you can develop a base of experience. There’s people from all over the world who come here and do as I have.”
The working-class French ambience comes from Boudjenah, who admires the camaraderie that grows among customers who frequent small, family-owned operations in France. “We hope that our customers become our friends,” he says earnestly. “And also friends with each other.”
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): Photos/J.B. Spector.
