This is the table of contents for the interview of Leon King. It is part of the National Ragtime and Jazz Archive which is located in Lovejoy Library at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.
For a complete contents list of all musician interviews for the oral history project, please click on this link: Oral History and Research Materials.
If interested in reviewing these materials from the National Ragtime and Jazz Archive, please contact Therese Dickman, Fine Arts Librarian.
Tape # Side |
Time |
Subject |
1 a |
015-127 |
Biographical; Birth, Parents, Siblings, early life
|
1 a |
128-159 |
Earliest musical experience- teacher in school; piano
|
1 a |
160-190 |
High school - East St. Louis Lincoln; trumpet - 6
|
1 a |
191-209 |
|
1 a |
210-375 |
Band leader- Harold Pickett, first band job; personnel;
|
1 a |
376-444 |
Artisan's Hall, Collinsville, listening to Charlie Creath
|
1 a |
445-506 |
University of Illinois; band audition, no blacks in band
|
1 a |
507-534 |
Joined band in Champaign; played dances frats and
|
1 a |
535-566 |
Aluminum Ore Co.; father has stroke; stayed home
|
1 a |
567-601 |
Joined "Bill' Polk's Band; Galesburg, 1927
|
1 a |
602-623 |
Postal clerk exam, St. Louis
|
1 a |
624-724 |
Playing with Cecil Scott Orchestra, St. Louis;
|
1 a |
725-740 |
Dewey Jackson Band, 1930; personnel |
1 b |
004-083 |
Jackson personnel cont'd; arrangements
|
1 b |
084-118 |
Where Jackson played, different halls
|
1 b |
119-139 |
Jackson as leader
|
1 b |
140-201 |
Playing on riverboat "St. Paul"; pay
|
1 b |
202-212 |
Marriage
|
1 b |
213-299 |
1931-34; riverboat "J.R." Marable and Jackson join
|
1 b |
300-336 |
Towns played along Mississippi River
|
1 b |
337-363 |
Dewey leaves band to join church
|
1 b |
364-442 |
Creath and Marable have band; personnel; New Orleans
|
1 b |
443-539 |
Lunceford Orchestra; leave from Post Office;
|
1 b |
540-550 |
Back to post office and Marable
|
1 b |
550-556 |
Noise on tape
|
1 b |
557-573 |
Mississippi River trips; towns boat stopped in
|
1 b |
574-617 |
New Orleans; jam sessions, Pelican Hall, musicians
|
1 b |
618-664 |
Job on boat, pay, living arrangements, food, hours
|
1 b |
665-667 |
Marable, personality, style
|
1 b |
668-692 |
New Orleans musicians, Armstrong
|
1 b |
693-718 |
Marable, Tab Smith; quits band, back to post office
|
1 b |
719-740 |
Union merger, suspension of Local 44 Charter |
2 a |
004-150 |
Union problems cont'd, Castle Ballroom, pay scale,
|
2 a |
151-243 |
Louie Armstrong plays with Jackson Band
|
2 a |
244-253 |
Don Redman band in St. Louis
|
2 a |
254-271 |
Types of brass mutes
|
2 a |
272-308 |
Fletcher Henderson in St. Louis, early 1930's
|
2 a |
309-325 |
Joe Smith, trumpet player
|
2 a |
326-359 |
Other bands traveling through St. Louis, McKinney's
|
2 a |
360-378 |
Post office, full time, working nights, quit Marable's
|
2 a |
379-464 |
1950, goes on days, George Hudson band; personnel;
|
2 a |
465-490 |
Vocalists with Hudson, Dinah Washington; Hudson as
|
2 a |
491-520 |
Leaves Hudson, rejoins Jackson, DeBalivere "Strip";
|
2 a |
521-549 |
Joe Smith Band at Windemere; personnel
|
2 a |
550-599 |
Playing on the "Strip"; second marriage; "The Barrel
|
2 a |
600-630 |
Boats, style of music, Foxtrots - bounce; Captain Joe
|
2 a |
631-664 |
Marable's Bands, popular tunes, Tab Smith arranger
|
2 a |
665-700 |
Best bands - Lunceford, Dewey Jackson, best rhythm
|
2 a |
701-720 |
Lunceford Band arrangements, Willie Smith, Joe
|
2 a |
721-738 |
De Balivere, East St. Louis jobs
|
2 b |
009-056 |
With Dewey Jackson in East St. Louis
|
2 b |
057-142 |
Jackson going to church choir, sideman
|
2 b |
143-266 |
Gaslight Square, Singleton Palmer, personnel, Thigpen,
|
2 b |
267-284 |
Opera House, Gaslight Square
|
2 b |
285-321 |
Eddie Johnson's Band, 1958, before Palmer; personnel
|
2 b |
322-427 |
Palmer's band, drinking on the job
|
2 b |
428-452 |
Other bands in Gaslight; demise of Gaslight Square
|
2 b |
453-488 |
Recording with Palmer; arrangements
|
2 b |
489-499 |
Norman Mason
|
2 b |
500-529 |
Left Gaslight 1969; surgery, other jobs
|
2 b |
530-641 |
First job with Havens and Mississippi Mudcats; 1971-
|
2 b |
642-664 |
Milwaukee trip
|
2 b |
667-687 |
Recording with Mudcats
|
2 b |
688-740 |
Musicians who impressed or influenced King |
E-mail comments and inquiries about the National Ragtime and Jazz Archive to Therese Dickman at tdickma@siue.edu or call 618-650-2695