477
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(MUSIC.) LARKINS, JOLLY
JOHN.
A Trip to the Jungles. Larkins
and Patterson’s Big Colored
Company.
Small folio, four page pictorial
flyer ; paper lightly and evenly tone, with
a few closed tears.
Erie, PA: Erie Litho, circa 1903
[400/600]
John Larkin (c1879-1936) was considered one
of the funniest men on stage at the peak of his
career. He performed with the Champion Cake
Walkers and Maurice Booms’ Black Diamond
Company until 1902, when he joined with
Dora Patterson as Larkins & Patterson. The
present show with Patterson toured the country
in 1902-1903. In 1907, Larkins joined up
with Black Patti’s touring group, as their chief
comedian. There he revised and combined his
“Trip to the Jungle,” and another routine, “A
Trip to Africa” into a starring vehicle for Black
Patti.
478
●
(MUSIC.) LUNCEFORD, JIMMY.
The New King of Syncopation. Jimmy
Lunceford and his Orchestra. (A piece of blank paper was added across the top
to accommodate the date the band was playing in this case, a Junior Prom.
Feb. 12.
Full sheet poster, 40 x 27 inches, framed.
New York: Lunceford Artists, circa 1929-1934
[1,500/2,500]
Jimmy Lunceford (1902-1947) led one of the
top jazz bands of the 1930’s well into the early
1940’s. In 1927, while an athletic instructor at
Manassas High School in Memphis, Tennessee,
Lunceford organized a student band, the
Chickasaw Syncopators, whose name was
changed to the Jimmie Lunceford Orchestra.
Under the new name, the band started its profes-
sional career in 1929, and made its first
recordings on Decca in 1930. After a period of
touring, the band accepted a booking at Harlem
Cotton Club in 1934. The Cotton Club had
already featured Duke Ellington and Cab
Calloway, who won their first widespread fame
from their inventive shows for the Cotton Club’s
all-white patrons. Lunceford’s orchestra, with
their tight musicianship and the often outrageous
humor in their music and lyrics, made an ideal
band for the club, and Lunceford’s reputation
began to steadily grow. Lunceford’s band differed
from other great bands of the time because their
work was better known for its ensemble than its
solo work. Additionally, he was known for using
a two-beat rhythm, called the Lunceford two-
beat, as opposed to the standard four-beat rhythm. This distinctive “Lunceford style” was largely the
result of the imaginative arrangements by trumpeter Sy Oliver which set high standards for dance-
band arrangers of the time.
477
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