Early Years

1 of 2 Pages     Next ›

(Trumpet, 1889–1949) William Geary ‘Bunk’ Johnson, a New Orleans trumpeter with good reading and improvising skills, said that he played in Buddy Bolden’s pioneer band before 1900. He was certainly associated with Frankie Duson and other Bolden cohorts, and was famous as a showy, lyrical soloist. Johnson’s nickname rose from his loquacity, and he was an inveterate self-promoter (he claimed to have mentored Louis Armstrong, among others). He played with Adam ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
324 Words Read More

Although not really the ‘Founder of the Delta Blues’, as one reissue album title touted, Charley Patton more than anyone defined not only the genre but also the image of the hard-living, rambling Delta bluesman, leaving trouble in his wake as he rolled from plantation to plantation and woman to woman. His rough vocal timbre – combined with the poor sound quality of the few surviving Paramount 78s he recorded ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
443 Words Read More

Clarence Williams was born in 1898 in Plaquemine, Louisiana, migrating to New Orleans in the teens to play piano in the District and begin a long career as a composer, bandleader and musical promoter. He was manager of two early jazz venues – the Big 25 Club and Pete Lala’s Café – hiring the best musicians in the city. He opened a publishing business with Armand J. Piron, the leader ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
584 Words Read More

(Vocals, harmonica, guitar, 1867–1963) Daddy Stovepipe – a.k.a. Mobile, Alabama native Johnny Watson – is an obscure figure, with only a scattering of recording sessions to his credit, but he represents an important era of blues and pre-blues music. He was not only one of the first downhome blues performers to record (in 1924), but his 1867 birth date is the earliest yet documented for any artist in the blues discographies: ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
193 Words Read More

(Instrumental group, 1900–17) The Eagle Band, originally led by Buddy Bolden, was an extremely popular and influential New Orleans ensemble. Frankie Duson (or Dusen) (1880–1940), a powerful tailgate trombonist, joined the band in 1906 and went on to take over the band when Bolden suffered a mental collapse the following year. Subsequently, Duson employed various Bolden alumni – guitarists Lorenzo Staulz and Brock Mumford, clarinetist Frank Lewis and cornettist Edward Clem. ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
218 Words Read More

(Vocals, piano, 1899–1993) Thomas A. Dorsey earned his greatest fame as the ‘Father of Gospel Music’ after leaving his blues career behind in 1932, but in his early days he was an important blues performer, songwriter, arranger and studio musician. In his youth in ragtime-era Atlanta and in Chicago from 1916, Dorsey developed his piano-playing skills at barrelhouses and rent parties. He also worked with jazz orchestras and Ma Rainey’s band ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
200 Words Read More

(Vocals, banjo, jug, kazoo, guitar, fiddle, piano, 1885–1979) A pioneering bluesman who became a central figure in the Memphis jug band scene, Gus Cannon may have been the first blues recording artist, if tales of music he recorded as early as 1898 are true. However, no documentary evidence of Cannon recordings has been retrieved prior to his Paramount sides of 1927; furthermore, if he did record almost 30 years earlier the ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
211 Words Read More

Edward ‘Kid’ Ory was born in LaPlace, Louisiana in 1886. He learned trombone and led a group of young musicians, the Woodland Band, which he took to New Orleans around 1908. He played with veteran jazzmen in the following years and gained a reputation as a powerful ensemble player and inspired soloist, especially where the blues were concerned. From Lala’s To LA In the teens, Ory worked at Pete Lala’s Café and ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
541 Words Read More

Gertrude ‘Ma’ Rainey, the ‘Mother of the Blues’, had been singing the blues for some two decades before she commenced her influential series of recordings for the Paramount label in 1923. She even laid claim to naming the music ‘the blues’ after hearing the singing of a young girl in Missouri in 1902, where Rainey was performing with a tent show. Assassinators Of The Blues Born Gertrude Pridgett on 26 April 1886, ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
422 Words Read More

(Vocals, guitar, 1892–1966) A songster and fingerpicking guitarist from Avalon, Mississippi, John Hurt excelled in the pre-blues black folk ballad tradition as well as in blues, gospel and dance instrumentals. He spent most of his life working on farms and entertaining at local parties and functions for both blacks and whites. His first opportunity to record came in 1928, when the white Mississippi fiddle/guitar duo of Narmour and Smith informed OKeh ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
166 Words Read More

(Instrumental group, 1922–25) The New Orleans Rhythm Kings (NORK) were one of the major white groups in early New Orleans jazz; after a run at Chicago’s Friar’s Club in 1922, they recorded with Paul Mares (trumpet), George Brunis (trombone), Leon Roppolo (clarinet), Jack Pettis (alto sax), Elmer Schoebel (piano), Lew Black (banjo), Steve Brown (bass) and Frank Snyder (drums). Mares was a skilful, Joe ‘King’ Oliver-esque lead, Roppolo a highly gifted ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
209 Words Read More

(Instrumental group, 1912–18) Freddie Keppard’s Original Creole Orchestra toured extensively during the teens as an early harbinger of authentic New Orleans jazz, reaching big-time vaudeville’s prestigious Orpheum circuit. Powerful pioneer trumpeter Keppard (1889–1933) had with him Creole clarinetists George Baquet, ‘Big Eye’ Louis Nelson and Jimmie Noone, pioneer bassist Bill Johnson and multi-instrumentalist Dink Johnson as a drummer. The band created a sensation among vaudeville audiences well before the Original Dixieland Jass ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
211 Words Read More

(Instrumental group, 1917–25) The Original Dixieland Jass Band were five young white musicians from working-class uptown New Orleans – Nick LaRocca (cornet), Larry Shields (clarinet), Eddie Edwards (trombone), Tony Spargo (real name Sbarbaro, drums) and Henry Ragas (piano). All alumni of ‘Papa’ Jack Laine’s stable of bands, they went to Chicago and then to New York, where their music created a sensation. The word ‘jazz’ or ‘jass’ was not spoken in ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
214 Words Read More

(Trumpet, vocals, 1884–1954) Oscar ‘Papa’ Celestin was a much-loved New Orleans fixture, who started out with the Algiers Brass Band, under Henry Allen Sr. at the turn of the century. In 1910 he founded the Original Tuxedo Jazz Orchestra with trombonist William ‘Baba’ Ridgley. Celestin recorded with OKeh and Columbia in the mid-1920s, and his recordings of ‘Original Tuxedo Rag’ and ‘Black Rag’ stand up well as sizzling hot jazz or ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
197 Words Read More

(Vocals, 1884–1955) Martin, an early classic blues singer, was signed by Clarence Williams for OKeh Records in 1922, at the beginning of the blues craze. While she was a pop-style singer, she was also able to pitch the blues in a rough-and-ready way. She recorded with Williams-led jazz groups, with such illustrious accompanists as King Oliver and Sidney Bechet (on some sessions she sang as ‘Margaret Johnson’ or ‘Sally Roberts’). Martin was ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel
176 Words Read More
1 of 2 Pages     Next ›

AUTHORITATIVE

An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...

CURATED

Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.

Rock, A Life Story

Rock, A Life Story

The ultimate story of a life of rock music, from the 1950s to the present day.

David Bowie

David Bowie

Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers his life, music, art and movies, with a sweep of incredible photographs.