Frank Joseph Christian (September 3, 1887 – November 27, 1973) was an early

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

trumpeter The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard B ...

Career

Frank Joseph Christian was born in the Bywater neighborhood of downtown

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

. In an interview for Tulane's Jazz Archives, he described his family ancestry as "cayudle", a Creole French term for a mutt or mongrel. His brothers Charles (1886–1964) and

Emile Christian Emile Joseph Christian (April 20, 1895 – December 3, 1973), sometimes spelled Emil Christian, was an early jazz trombonist; he also played cornet and string bass. He also wrote a number of tunes, including "Meet Me at the Green Goose", "Satani ...

also worked as professional musicians. Frank showed musical versatility at a young age, and was playing

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitches ...

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

, and

tuba The tuba (; ) is the lowest-pitched musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, the sound is produced by lip vibrationa buzzinto a mouthpiece. It first appeared in the mid-19th century, making it one of the ne ...

professionally by his teens. He started working with bandleader

Papa Jack Laine George Vital "Papa Jack" Laine (September 21, 1873 – June 1, 1966) was an American musician and a pioneering band leader in New Orleans in the years from the Spanish–American War to World War I. He was often credited for training many musici ...

about 1908 and became a mainstay in Laine's bands. He also worked in the bands of Tom Brown,

Johnny Fischer John W. Fischer (March 10, 1912 – May 25, 1984) was an American amateur golfer in the 1930s. Fischer was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. He won the 1932 NCAA individual golf championship and the Big Ten Conference individual championship in 1932 ...

, and led his own band. In 1916 Frank Christian was the first choice of

Alcide Nunez Alcide Patrick Nunez (March 17, 1884 – September 2, 1934), also known as Yellow Nunez and Al Nunez, was an American jazz clarinetist. He was one of the first musicians of New Orleans to make audio recordings. Biography Alcide Patrick Nunez wa ...

, Eddie Edwards, and

Johnny Stein John Philip Hountha "Johnny" Stein (1891 or 1895 in New Orleans – September 30, 1962 in New Orleans) was an American jazz drummer and bandleader. Stein's surnames are the subject of much confusion; his mother's name was Stein from a previous ...

to play in a band they had been hired to bring north to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. Christian initially agreed and rehearsed with the band before it left for the north, but then backed down as he had a full schedular of job offers in New Orleans and thought this less risky than leaving town. Christian was replaced by

Nick LaRocca Dominic James "Nick" LaRocca (April 11, 1889 – February 22, 1961), was an American early jazz cornetist and trumpeter and the leader of the Original Dixieland Jass Band. He is the composer of one of the most recorded jazz classics of all-time ...

, and thus Frank Christian missed his chance to be in the

Original Dixieland Jass Band The Original Dixieland Jass Band (ODJB) was a Dixieland jazz band that made the first jazz recordings in early 1917. Their "Livery Stable Blues" became the first jazz record ever issued. The group composed and recorded many jazz standards, the m ...

which made the first jazz recordings in 1917. After hearing of the commercial success of the O.D.J.B. and other New Orleans musicians who went north, Christian went to play in Chicago with Fischer and

Anton Lada Anton Lada (September 25, 1890 – August 28, 1944) was a ragtime, jazz and dance musician. He was a drummer. He played with and was the manager of the Louisiana Five. He recorded on Columbia Records and toured. He performed for dancing and vaude ...

. He then went to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in response to an offer to start a New Orleans style band to play at a

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

dance club called The Alamo. When Christian arrived in New York, Nick LaRocca of the Original Dixieland Jass Band was concerned about competition and offered Christian $200 and a return railway ticket to go back to New Orleans; Christian turned the offer down. He formed the

Original New Orleans Jazz Band The Original New Orleans Jazz Band was one of the first jazz bands to make recordings. Composed of mostly New Orleans musicians, the band was popular in New York City in the late 1910s. The group included some of the first New Orleans style play ...

with whom he recorded on

cornet The cornet (, ) is a brass instrument similar to the trumpet but distinguished from it by its conical bore, more compact shape, and mellower tone quality. The most common cornet is a transposing instrument in B, though there is also a sopr ...

in 1918 and 1919. He was originally the leader of the band, but later it was agreed to turn leadership over to the band's extroverted pianist,

Jimmie Durante James Francis Durante ( , ; February 10, 1893 – January 29, 1980) was an American comedian, actor, singer, vaudevillian, and pianist. His distinctive gravelly speech, Lower East Side accent, comic language-butchery, jazz-influenced song ...

. After Durante broke up his band Frank Christian toured

Vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...

with

Gilda Gray Gilda Gray (born Marianna Michalska; October 24, 1901 – December 22, 1959) was a Polish-American dancer and actress who popularized a dance called the "shimmy" which became fashionable in 1920s films and theater productions. Early life and 'th ...

and played in various theater and dance bands through the 1920s.

Death

He returned home to work his later years in New Orleans, where he died in 1973.

References

* New Orleans Jazz, a Family Album, Rose & Souchon, 1984 * Who's Who in Jazz, John Chilton, 1978 {{DEFAULTSORT:Christian, Frank Dixieland trumpeters Jazz musicians from New Orleans American jazz trumpeters American male trumpeters Vaudeville performers 1887 births 1973 deaths 20th-century trumpeters 20th-century American male musicians American male jazz musicians Original New Orleans Jazz Band members