Cotton Club
Encyclopedia
The Cotton Club was a famous night club in Harlem
, New York City
that operated during Prohibition
that included jazz music. While the club featured many of the greatest African American
entertainers of the era, such as Fletcher Henderson
, Duke Ellington
, Adelaide Hall
, Count Basie
, Bessie Smith
, Cab Calloway
, The Nicholas Brothers, Lottie Gee, Ella Fitzgerald
, Fats Waller
, Louis Armstrong
, Dizzy Gillespie
, Nat King Cole
, Billie Holiday
and Ethel Waters
, it generally denied admission to blacks. During its heyday, it served as a chic meeting spot in the heart of Harlem, featuring regular "Celebrity Nights" on Sundays, at which celebrities such as Jimmy Durante
, George Gershwin
, Al Jolson
, Mae West
, Irving Berlin
, Eddie Cantor
, Moss Hart
, New York mayor Jimmy Walker
and other luminaries would appear.
Heavyweight
boxing champion Jack Johnson
opened the Club De Luxe at 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue in Harlem
in 1920. Owney Madden
, a prominent bootlegger and gangster
, took over the club in 1923 while imprisoned in Sing Sing
and changed its name to the Cotton Club. While the club was closed briefly in 1925 for selling liquor, it reopened without trouble from the police. The dancers and strippers occasionally performed for Madden in Sing Sing
after his return there in 1933.
The club reproduced the racist imagery of the times, often depicting blacks as savages in exotic jungles or as "darkies" in the plantation
South
. The club imposed a more subtle color bar on the chorus girls whom the club presented in skimpy outfits: they were expected to be "tall, tan, and terrific," which meant that they had to be at least 5 feet 6 inches tall, light skinned, and under twenty-one years of age. Ellington was expected to write "jungle music" for an audience of whites.
Nonetheless, the club also helped launch the careers of Fletcher Henderson, who led the first band to play there in 1923, and Ellington, whose orchestra was the house band there from December 4th,1927 to June 30th,1931. The club not only gave Ellington national exposure through radio broadcasts originating there (first through WHN
, then over WEAF and after September 1929 through the NBC Red Network
- WEAF was the flagship station for that network - on Fridays), but enabled him to develop his repertoire while composing not only the dance tunes for the shows, but also the overtures, transitions, accompaniments, and "jungle" effects that gave him the freedom to experiment with orchestral colours and arrangements that touring bands rarely had. Ellington recorded over 100 compositions during this era, while building the group that he led for nearly fifty years. Eventually, in deference to a request by Ellington, the club slightly relaxed its policy of excluding black customers.
Cab Calloway's orchestra brought its Brown Sugar revue to the club in 1930, replacing Ellington's group after its departure in 1931; Jimmie Lunceford
's band replaced Calloway's in 1934, while Ellington, Armstrong, and Calloway returned to perform at the club in later years. The club was also the first show business opportunity for Lena Horne
, who began there as a chorus girl at the age of sixteen. Dorothy Dandridge
performed there while still one of The Dandridge Sisters, while Coleman Hawkins
and Don Redman
played there as part of Henderson's band. Tap dancers Bill "Bojangles" Robinson
, Sammy Davis Jr. (as part of the Will Mastin Trio), and the Nicholas Brothers
starred there as well.
The club also drew from white popular culture of the day. Walter Brooks, who had produced the successful Broadway
show Shuffle Along
, was the nominal owner. Dorothy Fields
and Jimmy McHugh
, one of the most prominent songwriting teams of the era, and Harold Arlen
provided the songs for the revue
s, one of which, "Blackbirds of 1928
", starring Adelaide Hall
featured the songs "I Can't Give You Anything But Love" and "Diga Diga Doo", produced by Lew Leslie
on Broadway. In 1934, Adelaide Hall
starred at the Cotton Club in the biggest grossing show that ever appeared at the club. Featured on the bill was the 16 year old Lena Horne
.
Closed temporarily in 1936 after the race riot in Harlem
the previous year, the Cotton Club reopened later that year at Broadway and 48th Street. It closed for good in 1940, under pressure from higher rents, changing tastes and a federal investigation into tax evasion by Manhattan
nightclub owners. The Latin Quarter
nightclub opened in its space and the building was torn down in 1989 to make way for a hotel. A new club with the same name opened in 1978 in Harlem on 125th street
.
and a West Coast branch of the Cotton Club existed in Culver City, California
in the late 1920s and early 1930s, featuring performers from the original Cotton Club such as Armstrong, Calloway and Ellington. A newer club has opened in Kuala Lumpur
, Malaysia.
is a movie directed by Francis Ford Coppola
, which offers a fictionalized history of the club in the context of race relations in the 1930s and the battles between Madden, Dutch Schultz
, Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll
, Lucky Luciano
, and Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson.
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...
, New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
that operated during Prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
that included jazz music. While the club featured many of the greatest African American
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
entertainers of the era, such as Fletcher Henderson
Fletcher Henderson
James Fletcher Hamilton Henderson, Jr. was an American pianist, bandleader, arranger and composer, important in the development of big band jazz and swing music. His was one of the most prolific black orchestras and his influence was vast...
, Duke Ellington
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
, Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Hall was an American-born U.K.-based jazz singer and entertainer.Hall was born in Brooklyn, New York and was taught to sing by her father...
, Count Basie
Count Basie
William "Count" Basie was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. Basie led his jazz orchestra almost continuously for nearly 50 years...
, Bessie Smith
Bessie Smith
Bessie Smith was an American blues singer.Sometimes referred to as The Empress of the Blues, Smith was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s...
, Cab Calloway
Cab Calloway
Cabell "Cab" Calloway III was an American jazz singer and bandleader. He was strongly associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City where he was a regular performer....
, The Nicholas Brothers, Lottie Gee, Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Jane Fitzgerald , also known as the "First Lady of Song" and "Lady Ella," was an American jazz and song vocalist...
, Fats Waller
Fats Waller
Fats Waller , born Thomas Wright Waller, was a jazz pianist, organist, composer, singer, and comedic entertainer...
, Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong , nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter and singer from New Orleans, Louisiana....
, Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...
, Nat King Cole
Nat King Cole
Nathaniel Adams Coles , known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an American musician who first came to prominence as a leading jazz pianist. Although an accomplished pianist, he owes most of his popular musical fame to his soft baritone voice, which he used to perform in big band and jazz genres...
, Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday was an American jazz singer and songwriter. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and musical partner Lester Young, Holiday had a seminal influence on jazz and pop singing...
and Ethel Waters
Ethel Waters
Ethel Waters was an American blues, jazz and gospel vocalist and actress. She frequently performed jazz, big band, and pop music, on the Broadway stage and in concerts, although she began her career in the 1920s singing blues.Her best-known recordings includes, "Dinah", "Birmingham Bertha",...
, it generally denied admission to blacks. During its heyday, it served as a chic meeting spot in the heart of Harlem, featuring regular "Celebrity Nights" on Sundays, at which celebrities such as Jimmy Durante
Jimmy Durante
James Francis "Jimmy" Durante was an American singer, pianist, comedian and actor. His distinctive clipped gravelly speech, comic language butchery, jazz-influenced songs, and large nose helped make him one of America's most familiar and popular personalities of the 1920s through the 1970s...
, George Gershwin
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...
, Al Jolson
Al Jolson
Al Jolson was an American singer, comedian and actor. In his heyday, he was dubbed "The World's Greatest Entertainer"....
, Mae West
Mae West
Mae West was an American actress, playwright, screenwriter and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned seven decades....
, Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history.His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous...
, Eddie Cantor
Eddie Cantor
Eddie Cantor was an American "illustrated song" performer, comedian, dancer, singer, actor and songwriter...
, Moss Hart
Moss Hart
Moss Hart was an American playwright and theatre director, best known for his interpretations of musical theater on Broadway.-Early years:...
, New York mayor Jimmy Walker
Jimmy Walker
James John Walker, often known as Jimmy Walker and colloquially as Beau James , was the mayor of New York City from 1926 to 1932...
and other luminaries would appear.
Heavyweight
Heavyweight
Heavyweight is a division, or weight class, in boxing. Fighters who weigh over 200 pounds are considered heavyweights by the major professional boxing organizations: the International Boxing Federation, the World Boxing Association, the World Boxing Council, and the World Boxing...
boxing champion Jack Johnson
Jack Johnson (boxer)
John Arthur Johnson , nicknamed the “Galveston Giant,” was an American boxer. At the height of the Jim Crow era, Johnson became the first African American world heavyweight boxing champion...
opened the Club De Luxe at 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue in Harlem
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...
in 1920. Owney Madden
Owney Madden
Owney "The Killer" Madden was a leading underworld figure in Manhattan, most notable for his involvement in organized crime during Prohibition. He also ran the famous Cotton Club and was a leading boxing promoter in the 1930s.-Early life:Owen Vincent Madden was born at 25 Somerset Street, in...
, a prominent bootlegger and gangster
Gangster
A gangster is a criminal who is a member of a gang. Some gangs are considered to be part of organized crime. Gangsters are also called mobsters, a term derived from mob and the suffix -ster....
, took over the club in 1923 while imprisoned in Sing Sing
Sing Sing
Sing Sing Correctional Facility is a maximum security prison operated by the New York State Department of Correctional Services in the town of Ossining, New York...
and changed its name to the Cotton Club. While the club was closed briefly in 1925 for selling liquor, it reopened without trouble from the police. The dancers and strippers occasionally performed for Madden in Sing Sing
Sing Sing
Sing Sing Correctional Facility is a maximum security prison operated by the New York State Department of Correctional Services in the town of Ossining, New York...
after his return there in 1933.
The club reproduced the racist imagery of the times, often depicting blacks as savages in exotic jungles or as "darkies" in the plantation
Plantation
A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...
South
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
. The club imposed a more subtle color bar on the chorus girls whom the club presented in skimpy outfits: they were expected to be "tall, tan, and terrific," which meant that they had to be at least 5 feet 6 inches tall, light skinned, and under twenty-one years of age. Ellington was expected to write "jungle music" for an audience of whites.
Nonetheless, the club also helped launch the careers of Fletcher Henderson, who led the first band to play there in 1923, and Ellington, whose orchestra was the house band there from December 4th,1927 to June 30th,1931. The club not only gave Ellington national exposure through radio broadcasts originating there (first through WHN
WHN
WHN was a radio station in New York City located at 1050 kHz. Its best known format was country music, which the station played from 1972 to 1987...
, then over WEAF and after September 1929 through the NBC Red Network
NBC Red Network
The NBC Red Network was one of the two original radio networks of the National Broadcasting Company. After NBC was required to divest itself of its Blue Network , the Red Network continued as the NBC Radio Network.It, along with the Blue Network, were the first two commercial radio networks in the...
- WEAF was the flagship station for that network - on Fridays), but enabled him to develop his repertoire while composing not only the dance tunes for the shows, but also the overtures, transitions, accompaniments, and "jungle" effects that gave him the freedom to experiment with orchestral colours and arrangements that touring bands rarely had. Ellington recorded over 100 compositions during this era, while building the group that he led for nearly fifty years. Eventually, in deference to a request by Ellington, the club slightly relaxed its policy of excluding black customers.
Jimmie Lunceford
James Melvin "Jimmie" Lunceford was an American jazz alto saxophonist and bandleader in the swing era.-Biography:...
's band replaced Calloway's in 1934, while Ellington, Armstrong, and Calloway returned to perform at the club in later years. The club was also the first show business opportunity for Lena Horne
Lena Horne
Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was an American singer, actress, civil rights activist and dancer.Horne joined the chorus of the Cotton Club at the age of sixteen and became a nightclub performer before moving to Hollywood, where she had small parts in numerous movies, and more substantial parts in the...
, who began there as a chorus girl at the age of sixteen. Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Jean Dandridge was an American actress and popular singer, and was the first African-American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress...
performed there while still one of The Dandridge Sisters, while Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Randolph Hawkins was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Hawkins was one of the first prominent jazz musicians on his instrument. As Joachim E. Berendt explained, "there were some tenor players before him, but the instrument was not an acknowledged jazz horn"...
and Don Redman
Don Redman
Donald Matthew Redman was an American jazz musician, arranger, bandleader and composer.Redman was announced as a member of the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame on May 6, 2009....
played there as part of Henderson's band. Tap dancers Bill "Bojangles" Robinson
Bill Robinson
Bill “Bojangles” Robinson was an American tap dancer and actor of stage and film. Audiences enjoyed his understated style, which eschewed the frenetic manner of the jitterbug in favor of cool and reserve; rarely did he use his upper body, relying instead on busy, inventive feet, and an expressive...
, Sammy Davis Jr. (as part of the Will Mastin Trio), and the Nicholas Brothers
Nicholas Brothers
The Nicholas Brothers were a famous African American team of dancing brothers, Fayard and Harold . With their highly acrobatic technique , high level of artistry and daring innovations, they were considered by many the greatest tap dancers of their day...
starred there as well.
The club also drew from white popular culture of the day. Walter Brooks, who had produced the successful Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
show Shuffle Along
Shuffle Along
Shuffle Along is the first major successful African American musical. Written by Flournoy Miller and Aubrey Lyles, with music and lyrics by Noble Sissle and Eubie Blake, the musical premiered on Broadway in 1921.-Plot:...
, was the nominal owner. Dorothy Fields
Dorothy Fields
Dorothy Fields was an American librettist and lyricist.She wrote over 400 songs for Broadway musicals and films...
and Jimmy McHugh
Jimmy McHugh
James Francis McHugh was a U.S. composer. One of the most prolific songwriters from the 1920s to the 1950s, he composed over 270 songs...
, one of the most prominent songwriting teams of the era, and Harold Arlen
Harold Arlen
Harold Arlen was an American composer of popular music, having written over 500 songs, a number of which have become known the world over. In addition to composing the songs for The Wizard of Oz, including the classic 1938 song, "Over the Rainbow,” Arlen is a highly regarded contributor to the...
provided the songs for the revue
Revue
A revue is a type of multi-act popular theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance and sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century American popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural presence of its own during its golden years from 1916 to 1932...
s, one of which, "Blackbirds of 1928
Blackbirds of 1928
Blackbirds of 1928 was a hit Broadway revue with music by Jimmy McHugh and lyrics by Dorothy Fields. It contained the songs "Diga Diga Do", the duo's first hit, "I Can't Give You Anything But Love", and "I Must Have That Man" all sung by Adelaide Hall....
", starring Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Hall was an American-born U.K.-based jazz singer and entertainer.Hall was born in Brooklyn, New York and was taught to sing by her father...
featured the songs "I Can't Give You Anything But Love" and "Diga Diga Doo", produced by Lew Leslie
Lew Leslie
Lew Leslie was a Broadway writer and producer. Although white, he was the first impressario to present black artists on stage...
on Broadway. In 1934, Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Hall
Adelaide Hall was an American-born U.K.-based jazz singer and entertainer.Hall was born in Brooklyn, New York and was taught to sing by her father...
starred at the Cotton Club in the biggest grossing show that ever appeared at the club. Featured on the bill was the 16 year old Lena Horne
Lena Horne
Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was an American singer, actress, civil rights activist and dancer.Horne joined the chorus of the Cotton Club at the age of sixteen and became a nightclub performer before moving to Hollywood, where she had small parts in numerous movies, and more substantial parts in the...
.
Closed temporarily in 1936 after the race riot in Harlem
Harlem Riot of 1935
The Harlem Riot of 1935 was Harlem's first race riot, sparked off by rumors of the beating of a teenage shoplifter. Three died, hundreds were wounded and an estimated $2 million in damages were sustained to properties throughout the district, with African-American owned homes and businesses spared...
the previous year, the Cotton Club reopened later that year at Broadway and 48th Street. It closed for good in 1940, under pressure from higher rents, changing tastes and a federal investigation into tax evasion by Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
nightclub owners. The Latin Quarter
Latin Quarter (nightclub)
Latin Quarter is a nightclub in New York City.The Club which originally opened in 1942 featured big name acts. In recent years it has been a focus of hip hop, reggaeton, and salsa music....
nightclub opened in its space and the building was torn down in 1989 to make way for a hotel. A new club with the same name opened in 1978 in Harlem on 125th street
125th Street (Manhattan)
125th Street is a two-way street that runs east-west in the New York City borough of Manhattan, considered the "Main Street" of Harlem; It is also called Martin Luther King, Jr...
.
Other branches
A Chicago branch of the Cotton Club was run by Ralph CaponeRalph Capone
Ralph "Bottles" Capone, Sr., was a Chicago mobster and an older brother of Al Capone. Ralph Capone got the nickname "Bottles" from the fact that he lobbied the Illinois Legislature to put into law that milk bottling companies had to stamp the date that the milk was bottled on the...
and a West Coast branch of the Cotton Club existed in Culver City, California
Culver City, California
Culver City is a city in western Los Angeles County, California. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 38,883, up from 38,816 at the 2000 census. It is mostly surrounded by the city of Los Angeles, but also shares a border with unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County. Culver...
in the late 1920s and early 1930s, featuring performers from the original Cotton Club such as Armstrong, Calloway and Ellington. A newer club has opened in Kuala Lumpur
Kuala Lumpur
Kuala Lumpur is the capital and the second largest city in Malaysia by population. The city proper, making up an area of , has a population of 1.4 million as of 2010. Greater Kuala Lumpur, also known as the Klang Valley, is an urban agglomeration of 7.2 million...
, Malaysia.
In popular culture
The Cotton ClubThe Cotton Club (film)
The Cotton Club is a 1984 crime-drama, centered on a famed Harlem jazz club of the 1930s, the Cotton Club.The movie was co-written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, choreographed by Henry LeTang, and starred Richard Gere, Diane Lane, and Gregory Hines...
is a movie directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. He is widely acclaimed as one of Hollywood's most innovative and influential film directors...
, which offers a fictionalized history of the club in the context of race relations in the 1930s and the battles between Madden, Dutch Schultz
Dutch Schultz
Dutch Schultz was a New York City-area Jewish American gangster of the 1920s and 1930s who made his fortune in organized crime-related activities such as bootlegging alcohol and the numbers racket...
, Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll
Mad Dog Coll
Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll was an Irish mob hitman in 1920s New York City. Coll gained notoriety for the accidental killing of a young child during a mob kidnap attempt.-Early years:...
, Lucky Luciano
Lucky Luciano
Charlie "Lucky" Luciano was an Italian mobster born in Sicily. Luciano is considered the father of modern organized crime in the United States for splitting New York City into five different Mafia crime families and the establishment of the first commission...
, and Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson.