Brass Bands Bloom in the South (1901)
By the turn of the century there were street brass bands, not only in New Orleans, but most other southern cities, performing at dances, funerals and on some of the early black vocal recordings of the day. With horns in the 'front line' and percussion, banjos or guitars in the 'back' - these bands' instrumentalists generally held day jobs, playing on the weekend for extra cash. These "semi-pro" collections were a huge influence on the "Dixieland Jass" of the 1910s.
W.C. Handy Has First Big Hit with 'Memphis Blues' (1909)
Everything changed when Alabama's W.C. ("Father of the Blues") Handy performed his band's hit 'Mr. Crump' for Memphis political boss, Edward H. Crump in 1909. The song, although not all complementary, went over well and Crump was elected. After being renamed 'Memphis Blues,' the self-published song went on to become one of the first Blues records in history in 1910.
First Calypso Recording Made (1912)
Calypso was one of the earliest musical genres outside the U.S. and Europe to be recorded. In 1912 a Trinidadian dance band led by "Lovey" (George Bailey) traveled to New York to record for Victor and Colombia records - on the advice of American tourists visiting Trinidad. In 1914 Columbia and Victor records made their own trip back to Trinidad to record more Calypso.
Boogie-Woogie Godfather Fats Waller Releases 'Squeeze Me' (1919)
New York City's "Stride" Piano King Fats Waller got his start playing rent parties. He released his first recording, 'Squeeze Me' in 1919 and got so popular that, according to legend, in 1926 he was forced to perform at gunpoint for three days for Al Capone. His best known composition 'Ain't Misbehaving,' sung by Billie Holiday in 1955, can be heard here.
Duke Ellington Made Cotton Club Band Leader (1928)
In 1927, King Oliver turned down a job as the house band for Harlem's whites only Cotton Club, and the job went to Washington D.C. native Duke Ellington. With a weekly show on the radio and the glitterati pouring in to see him, Ellington's popularity skyrocketed. Listen to the Duke Ellington Orchestra perform 'Take the A Train' in 1940.
RCA Victor Records Plena and Bomba Record (1928)
Plena and Bomba, two distinct yet intertwined West African based Puerto Rican music styles, were sought out by RCA Victor in the late '20s because the label wanted to expand to the Caribbean. The first artist brought into the studio was Manuel "Canario" Jimenez, a merchant marine and popular singer.
Thomas Dorsey Pens 'Precious Lord' (1932)
Thomas Andrew Dorsey is considered one of the fouding fathers of Gospel music. Dorsey, the music director at Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago from 1932 until the late 1970s, is best known for composing 'Take My Hand, Precious Lord' (Mahalia Jackson's signature song), which combined hymnal exhaultation with jazz and blues.
Billie Holiday is "Discovered" (1933)
On that fateful night, Columbia Records' John Hammond, an early white ally in the Jazz movement, was at Covan's in Harlem to see a singer named Monette Moore. A 17 year old Billie Holiday was also performing. After seeing Holiday, Hammond, who is credited with "discovering" Count Basie, Bessie Smith, Robert Johnson and Aretha Franklin as well, quickly set up three recording sessions at Columbia.
Ethel Waters Gets Equal Billing on Broadway (1933)
Best known for her roles in films 'Pinky,' 'Member of the Wedding' and 'Cabin In the Sky' (as seen in the trailer for the 1943 film), Waters received equal billing along with her white co-stars in Irving Berlin's Broadway musical 'As Thousands Cheer.' This was unprecedented at the time but consistent with the forward march of Ethel Waters' remarkable career.
Minton's Playhouse Opens (1938)
At this small Jazz club on 118th street in Harlem, Bebop was born. Musicians Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker and Thelonious Monk worked out the genre's kinks in late night bull sessions at Minton's in the late '30s and early '40s. Closed since the '70s, there are now plans to reopen the club at its original location in. Listen to Monk's "Well You Needn't" (1947).
BB King Hits the Road (1943)
As a kid B.B. King used to sing on the streets of Indianola, Miss. for money. He started out with Gospel, but made a lot more money performing secular songs on the war of the sexes. In 1943 he left home at 17, and moved to Greenwood, Miss. to sing at night clubs and perform on his first radio broadcast for the former WGRN radio station.
B.B. King on the Chitlin Circuit
The early days touring on the "big red bus," including the time he "borrowed" a guitar from a church for a gig he had to get to.
John Coltrane's and Thelonious Monk's Carnegie Hall Concert (1945)
In 2005, a long lost recording of Bebop kings' John Coltrane's and Thelonious Monk's Carnegie Hall Concert was found, as reported in this clip.