the Club McKenzie: Your 1920s Jazz Speakeasy
Series produced by Guy Rathbun

Joe "King" Oliver
A weekly program of Music and Stories for "The Jazz Age."
Across the spectrum of pop and jazz from the late teens to the early 1930s, this weekly series from the Club McKenzie invites you the share in the talents and tales of the musicians and performers that created an unforgettable era.
578 Pieces
Hear Me Talkin’ to Ya is the title of a 1920s song written by Ma Rainey. It is also a book by Nat Hentoff and Nat Shapiro that tells stories from t...
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One way to truly enjoy the earliest days of jazz is to hear directly from the musicians themselves. Only they can tell the story as it really was.
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The first glimmer that there was something new in the world of music became apparent in the deep south. It was long before Louis Armstrong and Bix ...
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Despite being one hundred years old, this is a very similar scene to what we experience today. In her research, author Betty Owens discovered that ...
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In the early 1990s, jazz trumpet Richard Sudhalter decided he needed to correct, what he perceived as a historical error: that the White jazz music...
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In the 1920s, dozens of new dances were introduced to a dance hungry public. From America to Europe, people were feeling the rhythm in their feet.
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The early Crescent City cornets set the standard for the decade of the 1920s. This program is a followup recognizing those creative artists who gen...
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The tradition of Crescent City cornetists and trumpeters begins with Buddy Bolden and ends with Henry “Red” Allen. It’s well documented on record t...
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He joined his first society orchestra in 1916, helped organize a regimental band during WWI, teamed up with rag time pianist Eubie Blake, and forme...
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Long before the age of the “Big Band Era”, bandleaders were creating swing in their orchestras. Nineteen-twenty-seven to 1936 was a decade of expe...
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Kansas City developed a unique style of jazz in the 1920s. Musicians borrowed heavily from blues and ragtime. In the process, the band leaders deve...
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Before there can be a singer there has to be a lyricist. Fortunately, the 1920s were rich in the number of creative wordsmiths. Not to mention the...
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: Jazz emphasized improvisation and individual expression. It became a symbol of freedom and rebellion. Especially for the young. The fact that it...
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One entry into the field of jazz that is frequently overlooked is the guitar. It belonged in the rhythm section. That is until Eddie Lang and a few...
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The group went by quite a number of different names, but the one they were best know for was The Washboard Rhythm Kings. They were, by far, the mos...
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Almost completely forgotten today is a little known band based in Los Angeles in 1929 & ’30. Paul Howard’s Quality Serenaders recorded a dozen titl...
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A few musicians made the upper echelons of jazz in the 1920s. But, for every one at the top, there are hundreds of talented performers who only rec...
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They were a team in 1928 when times were good, and reunited in 1938 at the peak of the depression. They were known as the Footwarmers and the Windy...
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When Adrian Rollini introduced the bass saxophone to the front line instruments, several other reed artists were inspired to follow suit. The big d...
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There was no roadmap to success for the Early instrumentalists and vocalists in jazz. They were in untested waters and out on a limb. Nevertheless,...
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