Jazz Banjo III: Johnny St. Cyr

Today, I will talk about early jazz banjo/ guitar pioneer Johnny St. Cyr. He was a guitar player converted to banjo for volume, and was leading his own trios by the age of 15 in 1905. He was a member of many famous New Orleans bands, before moving to Chicago in 1923, where he was a member of Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven, as well was Jelly Roll Morton's Red Hot Peppers. He still played guitar, but generally played the guitar banjo, a banjo strung like a guitar, that allowed banjo volume but let guitar players shift over without relearning chords and scale shapes. He occasionally played the higher tenor banjo, but generally stuck to the guitar banjo.

In 1930, he returned to New Orleans, still playing but making a living outside of music. In 1955 he moved to Los Angeles, returning to music full-time. In 1961, he became the bandleader of the Young Men From New Orleans, a group that played trad jazz at Disneyland on the riverboat, similar to the roaming groups of today. He played at many of the Jazz Nights at Disneyland, which were long festival events from 1960-1964 with many bands playing, usually focusing on early jazz. Personally, I don't quite like how trad jazz was relegated to Disneyland, but I know that without seeing the trad bands there as a child, I probably wouldn't have had any exposure to the traditional style of jazz, so I recognize that it was a very important institution once the 1960's came around. Anyways, this was just a summary- check out St. Cyr's autobiography for the full story as well as a deep dive into early jazz from someone who was there. It was never finished but is accessible freely online.