| Born in a small village Panama,
pianist Luis Russell was able to move to the United States after winning
$3000 in a lottery and eventually form his own band. Russell’s band emerged
before the rise of the swing era, and their style represented a blending
of the new swing and classic New Orleans jazz, with some blues thrown in,
as well. Such hot soloists as Henry
“Red” Allen and Barney Bigard
(before he joined Duke Ellington’s
band) can be heard. In 1935, he and his band began backing up Louis
Armstrong and, thus, were not heard as a separate entity for the next
ten years. |
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