Theatre Register

Jelly Roll Morton

Shows · Jelly Roll Morton

Composer 1890–1941

Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe (né Lemott, later Morton; c. September 20, 1890 – July 10, 1941), known professionally as Jelly Roll Morton, was an American blues and jazz pianist, bandleader, and composer of Louisiana Creole descent. Morton was jazz's first arranger, proving that a genre rooted in improvisation could retain its essential characteristics when notated. His composition "Jelly Roll Blues", published in 1915, was one of the first published jazz compositions. He also claimed to have invented the genre. Morton also wrote "King Porter Stomp", "Wolverine Blues", "Black Bottom Stomp", and "I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say", the last being a tribute to New Orleans musicians from the turn o…

Also credited on1 work

Jelly’s Last Jam

These come off the person record, which names a work and not a production. So we can say this name is attached to the work and we cannot say which staging, or in what capacity. For a composer or a writer that is the whole career we hold; there is no cast list to find them in.

In the literature8 passages

  • PAM KOSLOW HINES: Margo Lion had the idea of a jazz musical about Jelly Roll Morton and wondered if Gregory Hines would be interested in directing a workshop. But Greg wanted to play the character rather than direct him, and so we started on this long journey to theatricalize Jelly’s life.ebooks/Frommer, Myrna Katz & Frommer, Harvey/It Happened on Broadway_ An Oral History of the Great White Way - Myrna Katz Frommer & Harvey Frommer.txt
  • It was through Jelly that George C. Wolfe met Savion Glover, who played the part of the young Jelly Roll Morton. That was a very important connection.ebooks/Frommer, Myrna Katz & Frommer, Harvey/It Happened on Broadway_ An Oral History of the Great White Way - Myrna Katz Frommer & Harvey Frommer.txt
  • Music: Jelly Roll Morton, musical adaptation and additional music composed by Luther Hendersonebooks/Green, Stanley/Broadway Musicals, Show By Show - Seventh Edition - Stanley Green & Cary Ginell.txt
  • In the same edition, I had to play Gregory Hines as Jelly Roll Morton in a tight Afro wig. Need I tell you that number also didn't last through previews? I remember the evening when, during our Spider Woman number, Susanne Blakeslee somehow got cut and started to bleed all over her white Chita outfit. The audience thought it was part of t…ebooks/Portantiere, Gerard Alessandrini;Michael/B0030EGEYY EBOK - Gerard Alessandrini;Michael Portantiere.txt
  • It's entirely possible that Jelly Roll Morton and George Gershwin once met in Harlem. Gershwin, as a young man, lived in Harlem and, throughout his brief life, regularly haunted Harlem nightspots in search of musical enlightenment. Morton periodically turned up in Harlem during his own peripatetic performing years, even settling there for…ebooks/Singer, Barry/Ever After_ The Last Years of Musical Theater and Beyond - Barry Singer.txt
  • George Gershwin and Jelly Roll Morton did confront one another posthumously, though, on Broadway during the 1991-1992 season. In doing so they also parenthetically figured in a different sort of segregation that by now separated Broadway musicals into two camps: Those many projects shamelessly thrown together by producers to draw an audie…ebooks/Singer, Barry/Ever After_ The Last Years of Musical Theater and Beyond - Barry Singer.txt

Passages naming this person, found by keyword across 178 books. A keyword match is not a biography, and a common name will pull in the wrong one.

What this page does not know

  • What this person played. No cast list we hold records a character against a performer.
  • Any staging. This name appears in no production cast list we hold — 1,877 of 7,139 people are in that position, most of them writers, composers and designers rather than performers.
  • Which of the credits above the roles on this record — composer — apply to. The roles sit on the person and never on a credit, so a director who also acted looks the same here as one who did not.

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