Jazz Funeral For Legend To Correct Big Oversight
Times Picayune 09-6-1996

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The exact location of jazz pioneer Charles "Buddy" Bolden's final resting
place will likely never be known, for no one can pinpoint where his remains
lie in the jumble of gravesites in Holt Cemetery.

But the bigger mystery to some is why there has been no official commemoration
of the cornetist whom many music scholars believe ushered in the dawn of
modern jazz in turn-of-the-century New Orleans.

That oversight will be corrected today when the Delgado Community College jazz
studies program hosts a jazz funeral and the dedication of a memorial honoring
Bolden on what would have been his 119th birthday.

The Olympia Brass Band will supply the music for the funeral, which sets out
from the patio area behind Delgado Hall at 6 p.m. The procession will march
the short distance to Holt Cemetery, which borders the Delgado campus on City
Park Avenue. Bolden's granddaughter, Gertrude Bolden Tucker, and great-
granddaughter, Rita Bell, have come from Chicago for the festivities.

"He was in the right place at the right time and the right feeling was in the
air for something new," said Don Marquis, jazz historian and Bolden's
biographer. "Whether he invented jazz, I don't say that. But he was a pivotal
figure. All the older musicians say he was the one who started it."

Like Delta bluesman Robert Johnson and early zydeco accordionist Amede Ardoin,
Buddy Bolden is a shadowy, almost mythological figure who played a pivotal
role in the early development of his particular genre before having his career
cut short by misfortune.

But unlike Johnson and Ardoin, no recordings of Bolden's playing are known to
exist. His band reportedly made an Edison wax cylinder recording around 1898,
but it has never been found. If such a recording exists, it could be the Holy
Grail of jazz, a missing link in the evolution of a uniquely American art
form.

At its height, from 1903 to 1905, the Buddy Bolden Band was the most popular
in the city. "King" Bolden was the day's equivalent of a rock star, drawing
crowds of adoring fans whenever he played his cornet - which he allegedly did
with a volume and intensity greater than any other player. He frequented the
clubs that made up a black entertainment district around South Rampart and
Perdido streets, but his horn was supposedly audible for miles.

Based on accounts from musicians who played with Bolden and others who heard
him play, jazz scholars have concluded that Bolden was a bold innovator. He
may have been the first to add improvisation and a freewheeling spirit to the
music, signaling a crucial stylistic shift from traditional ragtime to what
would become modern jazz.

Had his career continued on the path he had set out, he may have become an
entertainer on par with Louis Armstrong. But around 1906, Bolden began
suffering bouts of insanity, and was committed to the state mental institution
in Jackson the next year. He died there in obscurity at age 54 in 1931. His
body was returned to New Orleans and buried without fanfare in a pauper's
grave in Holt Cemetery.

"Bolden was one of the most important figures in the early days of jazz and he
was never properly buried," Marquis said.

According to Marquis' book, "In Search of Buddy Bolden: First Man of Jazz,"
Bolden's body was eventually exhumed and moved several times to make way for
new graves. The cemetery did not keep records of where Bolden's remains ended
up.

For years, Marquis had wanted to stage a ceremony honoring Bolden but couldn't
find any support. He found that support this summer when Delgado began looking
for ways to publicize its new jazz studies program. The college's public
relations director, Joe Brennan, read Marquis' book and said, "I became aware
that Buddy Bolden is buried literally in Delgado's back yard."

Bolden's legacy lives on in this city and the music it gives to the world.
Delgado is using today's ceremony as a kickoff party for its jazz studies
program, which, like the jazz studies programs at the University of New
Orleans and Southern University, will educate young players who will
perpetuate the music Bolden helped create.

"It's full circle," Brennan said. "You've got the origins of jazz with Bolden
as a representative figure and the young players of today coming through
Delgado."