It seems possible, if I had the inclination, to pick a topic and then become the world's foremost scholar ON that topic. Obviously, I can't choose Shakespeare or Francisco Goya or Elizabeth Barrett Browning; really smart people have already done that better than I could hope to.

I also can't choose the superb Gypsy jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt. There's a guy named Stephane Wrembel who's a walking doctoral dissertation on Reinhardt. Not only that, but Wrembel can PLAY like Reinhardt. Do you know how hard that is?

Wrembel has devoted much of his musical skills to exploring and expanding on Reinhardt's catalog through a series of albums collectively called "The Django Experiment." In addition — and this is important — Wrembel composes his own tremendous music, both as a solo artist, with his quintet, and in soundtrack form for films like "Vicki Cristina Barcelona," "Midnight in Paris" and the new "Rifkin's Festival."

See Wrembel Friday when he brings his band to the Knickerbocker Music Center in Westerly. It'll be one of those you won't believe your eyes/ears experiences.

Stephane Wrembel Quintet, 8 p.m. Friday, doors 7 p.m., Knickerbocker Music Center, 35 Railroad Ave., Westerly; $25; www.knickmusic.com, (401) 315-5070.