P. G. Lowery and the Spread of African American Music | The Circus
P. G. Lowery and the Spread of African American Music | The Circus
African American circus bands helped spread the tradition of ragtime and blues across the country decades before the Harlem Renaissance.
In 1919, jazz bandleader P. G. Lowery joined the Ringling Brothers’ circus. As a young man, he had trained at the Boston Conservatory. He’d been heading up black circus bands ever since.
Like all black…
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Mr. Lowery was not a jazz musician. Like W. C. Handy he was a band leader and Cornet soloist. Cornet soloists were the rock stars of their day. He played ragtime and marches and popular music of the day. But he was known to be able to play high notes and Louis Armstrong said he was inspired by Lowery to play high notes.
Any surviving recordings of P.G. Lowery? Like Handy, he may have been a lot less of a 'jazz' musician than we might want to think.