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Jelly Roll Morton

All Songs Considered

Patti Smith, Jelly Roll Morton, Jens Lekman

Horses remastered and live from Patti Smith; A preview of new music by Nellie McKay; A new retrospective on Jelly Roll Morton; Stunning slack key guitar from Sonny Lim and more.

Patti Smith, Jelly Roll Morton, Jens Lekman

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Wynton Marsalis Group: Live In Concert

Wynton Marsalis. Clay Patrick McBride/Jazz at Lincoln Center hide caption

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Clay Patrick McBride/Jazz at Lincoln Center

Toast Of The Nation

Wynton Marsalis Group: Live In Concert

WBGO

By necessity, the early jazz pioneers knew how to make music for revelers. So it made sense that Marsalis put the tunes of Jelly Roll Morton and King Oliver on the bill for this New Year's Eve bash.

Wynton Marsalis Group In Concert

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Review

Music Articles

Jazz 2005: Kevin Whitehead's Top 10

Fresh Air

For lovers of jazz music, the year 2005 brought a wealth of reissues by critical artists from Jelly Roll Morton to John Coltrane. The music, the result of exhaustive archival and restoration work, adds new details to one of America's richest musical traditions.

Jazz 2005: Kevin Whitehead's Top 10

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Music

Jelly Roll Morton Plays the Library of Congress

In 1938, at a low point in his career, Jelly Roll Morton recorded a series of interviews and performances with the folklorist Alan Lomax. Now those recordings have been released in a new box set from Rounder Records called Jelly Roll Morton: The Complete Library of Congress Recordings.

Jelly Roll Morton Plays the Library of Congress

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Review

Basic Jazz Record Library

Jelly Roll Morton: 'His Best Recordings: 1926-1939'

Jelly Roll Morton claimed that he invented jazz. While this statement provoked much criticism, Morton is widely considered the first great composer of jazz. Morton's most popular tunes, including the frequently copied "King Porter Stomp," can be found on this album.

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'King Porter Stomp'

Ferdinand Joseph La Menthe, better known as Jelly Roll Morton. Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption

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Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Music Articles

'King Porter Stomp'

Jelly Roll Morton wrote 'King Porter Stomp' back in the early 1900s, when he was still a teenager, playing piano in the clubs of his hometown, New Orleans.

'King Porter Stomp'

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Songs To Stomp Out The Graduation Blues

Woody Herman took the stately "Pomp and Circumstance" and made it a party. Photo Illustration: Lars Gotrich; Photos: Keystone/Hulton Archive, iStock. hide caption

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Photo Illustration: Lars Gotrich; Photos: Keystone/Hulton Archive, iStock.

Take Five: By Theme

Songs To Stomp Out The Graduation Blues

WBGO

When the frustration of applying to hundreds of entry-level positions gets to be too much to bear, just stomp it out with these five jazz tracks. After that, you'll be ready to face the world beyond the cap and gown.

Celebrate Mardi Gras With New Orleans Piano

Professor Longhair's "Tipitina" is a New Orleans funk staple and a template for the New Orleans piano style. Eric Bookhart/Harvest Records hide caption

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Eric Bookhart/Harvest Records

Take Five: By Holiday

Celebrate Mardi Gras With New Orleans Piano

Jazz24

One of the beauties of New Orleans piano music is that once you hear it, you'll know it whenever you encounter it again. It's Mardi Gras week in New Orleans, and we're going to join in the celebration with a brief but broad overview of some of the Crescent City's many extraordinary pianists.

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