“Scrabble” by The Louie Gee Ensemble

Posted on Feb 4, 2009 by LuiGi |

A few months ago at a family dinner, I had the idea to cover Rene Costy’s well known track “Scrabble”. As I was talking with my dad about samples and songs used in today’s hiphop culture, we ended our conversation on J Dilla’s classic “Fuck the Police“, where he used that very particular theme from the Belgian violonist Rene Costy. My dad never heard about Jay Dee or J Dilla, but surprisingly he knew a lot about Costy’s work and background.

Rene Costy was one of the leading classical violin players of his era. Technically skilled as no other, he participated in lots of recording sessions in the French variété scene after World War II. Costy also made some (nowadays sought after) library records on labels such as MP2000 and Chappell music, and some releases on the obscure Belgian label Selection.

As I’m not a big fan of covering or duplicating existing tracks, we tried to approach the original song in a different way. The result is a bossa-jazz inspired tune, where my dad brings a Gypsy twist on the violin part. Together with my old time friends Hendrik Vanattenhoven on double bass and Pierre Anckaert on electric piano - plus yours truly on drums - we gave it a complete makeover.

Re-arranged by Pierre Anckaert & Louis Van de Leest Jr.
Recorded and mixed by Louis Van de Leest Jr.
Louis Van de Leest Sr. - violin
Hendrik Vanattenhoven - double bass
Pierre Anckaert - fender rhodes
Louis Van de leest Jr. aka LuiGi from Infinitskills - drums

First two pictures by Louis Van de Leest Jr. - Third one by Eric Paquet.


Published by LuiGi - Louis "LuiGi" Van De Leest is a dj, drummer and beatmaker within the MonkeyRobot duo (ex-Infiniskills).
Related Posts:

42 Responses to ““Scrabble” by The Louie Gee Ensemble”

  1. Funky Bompa, on February 4th, 2009 at 3:28 pm Said:

    Nice !
    Good to see Pierre & Hendrik teaming up with you !!

  2. Funky Bompa, on February 4th, 2009 at 3:32 pm Said:

    Louie, let me know when you have a full set and you’ll get a gig at the Atelier 210 ;)

  3. Dee, on February 4th, 2009 at 4:23 pm Said:

    yeah definately nice track !

  4. Cannonball, on February 4th, 2009 at 6:25 pm Said:

    Very nice tune,press it on vinyl,would be nice-)

  5. Blast kid, on February 4th, 2009 at 7:03 pm Said:

    I really love this concept and I think the result is really nice. Also nice to hear Pierre on rhodes for the first time, I only heard him play piano before. And Louis, that drumming is tight as well.

  6. azer, on February 4th, 2009 at 7:07 pm Said:

    Great track!
    Fuck the Police is one of my favorite dilla tracks, knew the sample but had no idea it was Belgian

  7. eric, on February 4th, 2009 at 8:49 pm Said:

    Good job guys.

  8. rHil, on February 4th, 2009 at 10:09 pm Said:

    damn really nice well done louis

  9. JoBee, on February 4th, 2009 at 10:18 pm Said:

    Woooow!Big -up!!!

  10. Ali, on February 4th, 2009 at 11:18 pm Said:

    More! More! More!

  11. Biaz, on February 5th, 2009 at 2:45 am Said:

    Very nice. sounds very good. big up.

  12. LP, on February 5th, 2009 at 6:04 am Said:

    beautiful, and very tight playing, sounds like you guys have been playing together forever……

  13. Laid Back » Laid Back Show - 04/02/2009, on February 5th, 2009 at 11:02 am Said:

    [...] Incks sent us tracks and announced she will visit us in the FM Brussel’s studio on the 3rd of March (thanks Alex), 40 Winks updated their playlist for “Times & Themes” on LDBK and added their newest track in the batch, Tony from the Farm Prod crew dropped by to tell us more about “The Good, the Dead and the Ugly” event where Eric P., wHo?, rHil and FabE will be providing some musical atmosphere… The Infinitskills brothers gathered all of that in a one hour show also featuring five of Eric’s latest beats and LuiGi’s bossa-jazz version of “Scrabble“. [...]

  14. Spans, on February 5th, 2009 at 12:09 pm Said:

    fingerlickin’ good!

    PROPS

  15. AME, on February 5th, 2009 at 1:10 pm Said:

    louis ur sick!

  16. Glue, on February 5th, 2009 at 2:47 pm Said:

    i like this… a lot!
    fresh and breezy…

  17. DeLuca, on February 5th, 2009 at 3:23 pm Said:

    Oh my goodness! Very nice guys. Is it okay if I play it in my upcoming show (www.royalgroove.org).

    Please drop me a line…

    cheers.

  18. aicha rachati, on February 5th, 2009 at 3:59 pm Said:

    Wow!! what a genius!!!!Soooooo beautiful!!

  19. Julius, on February 5th, 2009 at 4:50 pm Said:

    Thanks for your great comments!

    DeLuca -> sure go ahead.

  20. .dee, on February 5th, 2009 at 5:28 pm Said:

    dope…

  21. Weedy, on February 5th, 2009 at 10:12 pm Said:

    nice!

  22. Laid Back » Download - “Scrabble”, on February 6th, 2009 at 1:02 pm Said:

    [...] Back projects but … unfortunately it’s not the case. So when LuiGi gave me that “Scrabble” track on Tuesday we were both wondering what to do with it. The original plan was to post a [...]

  23. Aaron G., on February 9th, 2009 at 4:39 pm Said:

    Chapeau- great !

    Best from Cologne/ Germany
    Aaron

  24. U, on February 12th, 2009 at 12:36 pm Said:

    damn… so sweet!

    this song asks for a 7″ release if you ask me

  25. Laid Back » Laid Back Show - 18/02/2009, on February 19th, 2009 at 10:50 am Said:

    [...] if you enjoyed that Scrabble track we presented a few days ago, you might also want to attend… Pierre Anckaert Trio feat. [...]

  26. BEN & K, on February 25th, 2009 at 10:43 pm Said:

    DAAAAMN,

    really nice guys!!

    greets van Ben & K!

  27. Incks, on March 13th, 2009 at 2:35 am Said:

    Luvin’ it!! I agree that you should press this on vinyl for the luv of it!

  28. Julius, on March 13th, 2009 at 9:16 am Said:

    Working on it…

  29. Laid Back » Laid Back Show - 25/03/2009, on March 26th, 2009 at 11:46 am Said:

    [...] few weeks ago, after we sent him a copy of Louie Gee’s Scrabble, Tome - dj on 057 radio - offered us a weekly show on his station… Nice, fast and easy. Just [...]

  30. Laid Back » Mitsu the Beats remixing Scrabble, on April 19th, 2009 at 12:59 pm Said:

    [...] label Jazzy Sport who seemed interested in releasing Louie Gee Ensemble’s first track “Scrabble” and even suggested to put a Mitsu the Beats remix of the Rene Costy cover on the B side of [...]

  31. Laid Back » Introducing… Monique Harcum, on April 20th, 2009 at 10:47 am Said:

    [...] crowd is because on Friday we will present the second track of the Louie Gee Ensemble (remember Scrabble?) where she is taking care of the vocal part. This track is already playing on our online radio so [...]

  32. Laid Back » Laid Back Show - 17/06/2009, on June 18th, 2009 at 9:44 am Said:

    [...] - Monkey Sequence 01 Floating Points - Shangrila The Louie Gee Ensemble - Scrabble (DJ Mitsu the Beats [...]

  33. Julius, on June 18th, 2009 at 12:05 pm Said:

    Vinyl release coming soon on Jazzy Sport. Pre-order through Rush Hour.

  34. Laid Back » Scrabble 7inch coming soon., on June 19th, 2009 at 10:48 am Said:

    [...] has been sampled by Jay Dee for “Fuck the Police” and covered in a bossa version by the Louie Gee Ensemble. Soon after Louis presented this track, we got contacted by Japanese label Jazzy Sport who offered [...]

  35. Costy Michel, on June 24th, 2009 at 4:30 pm Said:

    Cher Ami,

    Je suis le fils de René Costy et je suis tout surpris et ravi qu’une oeuvre de mon père pationne encore aujourd’hui un public.
    c’est formidable !
    Mais, au fait, savez-vous qui était mon papa ?

  36. eric p, on June 24th, 2009 at 4:41 pm Said:

    Non pas du tout , on voudrais bien en savoir plus.

  37. LuiGi, on June 24th, 2009 at 9:51 pm Said:

    Mr Costy, la musique de votre pere est toujours vivante, ne vous inquietez pas!

    Louie Gee

  38. Laid Back » Scrabble 7inch - Official release, on August 30th, 2009 at 2:07 pm Said:

    [...] 1 (February): The Louie Gee Ensemble’s version of Rene Costy’s classic is posted on the Laid Back blog and we start exchanging emails with the Jazzy Sport crew about a [...]

  39. Scrabble, globalization, dopeness « Tom Van Hout, on September 11th, 2009 at 9:20 pm Said:

    [...] productions. Does it get any better than this? Case in point: the global trajectory and flavor of Scrabble, a laid-back.be production. What started as a blog post, grew into a Japanese remix and [...]

  40. Laid Back » Strings Attached, on December 26th, 2009 at 6:10 pm Said:

    [...] who collaborated earlier this year with the Louie Gee Ensemble on their first two tracks “Scrabble” and “You Belong to me feat. Monique Harcum“. After being awarded the first prize [...]

  41. www.on-point.be - vic&lloyd say: go!, on January 6th, 2010 at 4:51 pm Said:

    [...] LuiGi / Louie Gee Ensemble One third of the infamous InfinitSkills crew, LuiGi is soon to step in the spotlight. January alone will see remixes of JtotheC’s Nono and Dynooo’s Fuh Real hitting your local record stores. Only to be followed by a collaboration with jazz man Pierre Anckaert and remixes by Louis and Eric P. Also expect LuiGi continuing his collaboration with Baloji, and further exploring musical horizons with his Louie Gee Ensemble, following the success of last year’s Scrabble 7inch, out on Jazzy Sport. On the live side of things I’m expecting Louis and Eric P to hit hard too, as they’ve proven only a couple of months ago at the Release event. (site) [...]

  42. Tim, on May 23rd, 2010 at 1:56 am Said:

    That is superb, well done! I would love to get hold of the piano notation for that! :-)

Leave a Reply