Gustave "Gussie" Mueller (New Orleans, Louisiana

New Orleans, Louisiana

New Orleans is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The New Orleans metropolitan area has a population of 1,235,650 as of 2009, the 46th largest in the USA. The New Orleans – Metairie – Bogalusa combined statistical area has a population...

 April 17, 1890 – Hollywood, California December 16, 1965) was an early jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 clarinetist.

Mueller was one of the top clarinetists with Papa Jack Laine

Papa Jack Laine

George Vital "Papa Jack" Laine was a pioneering band leader in New Orleans in the years from the Spanish-American War to World War I....

's bands in New Orleans before going to Chicago, Illinois with Tom Brown's

Tom Brown (trombonist)

Tom Brown , sometimes known by the nickname Red Brown, was an early New Orleans dixieland jazz trombonist. He also played string bass professionally....

 band in early 1915. After serving in the Army in World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 he moved to California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

 and joined the early Paul Whiteman

Paul Whiteman

Paul Samuel Whiteman was an American bandleader and orchestral director.Leader of the most popular dance bands in the United States during the 1920s, Whiteman's recordings were immensely successful, and press notices often referred to him as the "King of Jazz"...

 Orchestra, with which he moved to 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...

. He helped give Whiteman an idea of the Dixieland

Dixieland

Dixieland music, sometimes referred to as Hot jazz, Early Jazz or New Orleans jazz, is a style of jazz music which developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century, and was spread to Chicago and New York City by New Orleans bands in the 1910s.Well-known jazz standard songs from the...

 jazz style.

One of the Whiteman Orchestra's early hit records, as well as one of the unfortunately few recordings where Mueller can be heard prominently, is The Wang Wang Blues which Mueller dominates in a style similar to Larry Shields

Larry Shields

Lawrence James "Larry" Shields was an early American dixieland jazz clarinetist.Shields was born into an Irish-American family in Uptown New Orleans, on the same block where jazz pioneer Buddy Bolden lived...

 while somewhat foreshadowing the early work of Sidney Bechet

Sidney Bechet

Sidney Bechet was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer.He was one of the first important soloists in jazz , and was perhaps the first notable jazz saxophonist...

. While Mueller shares composer credit on "Wang Wang", some of his New Orleans contemporaries said the number was all his and he had featured it before joining Whiteman.

As Paul Whiteman started taking himself more seriously and began demanding arrangements with little room for improvisation, Mueller left the band in November 1920, saying "You call yourselves a jazz band, but you can't play the blues

Blues

Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...

 worth a damn".

Mueller returned to California to join his old friend (and fellow Tom Brown Band alumnus) Ray Lopez in the Abe Lyman

Abe Lyman

Abe Lyman was a popular bandleader from the 1920s to the 1940s. He made recordings, appeared in films and provided the music for numerous radio shows, including Your Hit Parade....

 Orchestra. Mueller stayed in the Los Angeles

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

 area, playing with dance bands, novelty and "Hillbilly

Hillbilly

Hillbilly is a term referring to certain people who dwell in rural, mountainous areas of the United States, primarily Appalachia but also the Ozarks. Owing to its strongly stereotypical connotations, the term is frequently considered derogatory, and so is usually offensive to those Americans of...

" bands, and working on motion picture soundtracks before retiring after World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

.