George Dixon (April 8, 1909 – August 1, 1994) was an American

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 m ...

trumpeter and multi-instrumentalist.

Early life

Born in New Orleans, Dixon moved often as a child with his father, a minister who toured the American South. He began playing violin at age 13 while living in Natchez, Mississippi, and studied the instrument at

Arkansas State College Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from ...

, where he also picked up alto saxophone.

Career

Dixon moved to

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

in 1926, where he played with Sammy Stewart from 1928, including on a tour of

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

in 1930. Dixon then worked with Earl Hines throughout the decade of the 1930s. He led a

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

band in

Memphis, Tennessee Memphis is a city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the seat of Shelby County in the southwest part of the state; it is situated along the Mississippi River. With a population of 633,104 at the 2020 U.S. census, Memphis is the second-mos ...

, during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, then played in Chicago with Floyd Campbell, Ted Eggleston, and others. He led his own band at the Circle Inn in the 1940s and early 1950s. Around mid-1950s, Dixon stopped playing full-time, though he continued to play occasionally until his death in 1994.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dixon, George 1909 births 1994 deaths Arkansas State University alumni American jazz trumpeters American male trumpeters Jazz musicians from New Orleans 20th-century American musicians 20th-century trumpeters Jazz musicians from Arkansas 20th-century American male musicians American male jazz musicians Jazz alto saxophonists American jazz alto saxophonists