Red Hot Jazz Archive

Redhotjazz.com was a pioneering website during the “Information wants to be Free” era of the 1990s. In that spirit we are recovering the lost data from the now defunct site and sharing it with you.
Most of the music in the archive is in the form of MP3s hosted on Archive.org or the French servers of Jazz-on-line.com where this music is all in the public domain.
Files unavailable from those sources we host ourselves. They were made from original 78 RPM records in the hands of private collectors in the 1990s who contributed to the original redhotjazz.com. They were hosted as .ra files originally and we have converted them into the more modern MP3 format. They are of inferior quality to what is available commercially and are intended for reference purposes only. In some cases a Real Audio (.ra) file from Archive.org will download. Don’t be scared! Those files will play in many music programs, but not Windows Media Player.
Lil Armstrong Chicago Boys Gotham

Lil Armstrong and her Chicago Boys

Title Recording Date Recording Location Company Baby Daddy (Lil Armstrong / Williams) 4-4-1950 Chicago, Illinois Gotham G 241 A Baby Daddy (Lil Armstrong) 4-4-1950 Chicago, Illinois

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Lil Armstrong and her Orchestra

Title Recording Date Recording Location Company Everything’s Wrong, Ain’t Nothing Right Vocal Chorus by Lil Armstrong (Lil Armstrong / Evans) 9-8-1938 New York, New York Decca 2542

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Louis Armstrong and Lil Hardin

Lil’s Hot Shots

Lil’s Hot Shots was a pseudonym for Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five. This name was used when recording for Vocalion.   Title   Recording Date  

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Midnight Serenaders

This is likely a photo of the Midnight Serenaders that recorded for Paramount in 1928. If so they were led in the studio by Bill

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Bill Haid's Cubs

Bill Haid’s Cubs

Bill Haid played banjo for the Coon Sanders Nighthawks Orchestra and led several small recording sessions in Chicago and New York for Paramount and Broadway

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Blue Ribbon Syncopators

In the 1920s, the top African-American band in Buffalo, NY was the Blue Ribbon Syncopators. They recorded in their hometown for Okeh Records in 1925,

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Jimmie's Joys

Jimmie’s Joys

Title Recording Date Recording Location Company Bugle Call Rag (Elmer Schoebel / Jack Pettis / Meyers) 8-1-1923 Los Angeles, California Golden B-1865 No No Nora

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The Clicquot Club Eskimos

The Clicquot Club Eskimos

The Clicquot Club Eskimos was a banjo orchestra under the direction of Harry Reser. The band was quite well known because of its nationwide weekly half-hour

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Irving Mills and his Modernists

Although Irving Mills is remembered mostly as a music publisher and for being the manager of the Duke Ellington Orchestra he was also a singer and songwriter. Mills contributed vocals to

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The Hotsy Totsy Boys

Here is a nice little recording that was never released and existed only as a test pressing. “Everything Is Hotsy Totsy Now” was a very

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Pinetop Smith (1904-1929)

Clarence “Pine Top” Smith (June 11, 1904 – March 15, 1929) was one of the earliest pianists to recorded a boogie-woogie” piano solo. His 1928

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Lucille Bogan

Bogan’s Birmingham Busters

Lucille Bogan’s recording career came to an end in 1935 and she eventually returned to Birmingham where she reverted to her real name and performed

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Dolly Kay

Dolly Kay (1900?-1982)

Dolly Kay (12 June 1900? – 26 August 1982) was a vaudeville and cabaret singer who started performing sometime around 1920 on the Orpheum curcuit

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