caption associated_acts death_date death_place years_active alias birth_place label name background birth_date instrument genre image article_title birth_name occupation
jordan in new york , about july 1946 tympany five 4 february 1975 los angeles , california , united states 1932 -- 1975 `` the king of the jukebox '' brinkley , arkansas , united states decca , mercury louis jordan solo_singer 8 july 1908 alto vocals saxophone , saxophone , piano , clarinet , swing band comedy music jump blues jazz blues r & b big louis . july 1946 -lrb- william p. gottlieb 04721 -rrb- . jordan jpg , new york , n.y. , ca louis jordan
 louis thomas jordan bandleader , songwriter , singer , saxophonist , actor
louis jordan

louis thomas jordan -lrb- july 8 , 1908 -- february 4 , 1975 -rrb- was a pioneering american musician , songwriter and bandleader who enjoyed his greatest popularity from the late 1930s to the early 1950s .
known as `` the king of the jukebox '' , he was highly popular with both black and white audiences in the later years of the swing era .
jordan was one of the most successful african-american musicians of the 20th century , ranking fifth in the list of the all-time most successful black recording artists according to `` billboard '' magazine 's chart methodology .
though comprehensive sales figures are not available , he scored at least four million-selling hits during his career .
jordan regularly topped the r&b `` race '' charts , and was one of the first black recording artists to achieve a significant crossover in popularity into the mainstream -lrb- predominantly white -rrb- american audience , scoring simultaneous top ten hits on the white pop charts on several occasions .
after duke ellington and count basie , louis jordan was probably the most popular and successful african-american bandleader of his day .
jordan was a talented singer with great comedic flair , and he fronted his own band for more than twenty years .
he duetted with some of the biggest solo singing stars of his day , including bing crosby , ella fitzgerald and louis armstrong .
jordan was also an actor and a major black film personality -- he appeared in dozens of `` soundies '' -lrb- promotional film clips -rrb- , made numerous cameos in mainstream features and short films , and starred in two musical feature films made especially for him .
he was an instrumentalist who played all forms of the saxophone , but specialized in the alto , in addition to playing piano and clarinet .
a productive songwriter , he wrote or co-wrote many songs that became influential classics of 20th-century popular music .
although jordan began his career in big-band swing jazz in the 1930s , he became famous as one of the leading practitioners , innovators and popularizers of `` jump blues '' , a swinging , up-tempo , dance-oriented hybrid of jazz , blues and boogie-woogie .
typically performed by smaller bands consisting of five or six players , jump music featured shouted , highly syncopated vocals and earthy , comedic lyrics on contemporary urban themes .
it strongly emphasized the rhythm section of piano , bass and drums ; after the mid-1940s , this mix was often augmented by electric guitar .
jordan 's band also pioneered the use of electric organ .
with his dynamic tympany five bands , jordan mapped out the main parameters of the classic r&b , urban blues and early rock 'n' roll genres with a series of hugely influential 78 rpm discs for the decca label .
these recordings presaged many of the styles of black popular music in the late 1940s , 1950s and 1960s , and exerted a huge influence on many leading performers in these genres .
many of his records were produced by milt gabler , who went on to refine and develop the qualities of jordan 's recordings in his later production work with bill haley , including `` rock around the clock '' .
