Eddie Condon

A major propagandist for freewheeling Chicago jazz, an underrated rhythm guitarist, and a talented wisecracker, Eddie Condon's main importance to jazz was not so much through his own playing as in his ability to gather together large groups of all-stars and produce exciting, spontaneous, and very coherent music.



Condon started out playing banjo with Hollis Peavey's Jazz Bandits when he was 17, he worked with members of the famed Austin High School Gang in the 1920s, and in 1927 he co-led (with Red Mckenzie) The Mckenzie-condon Chicagoans on a record date that helped define Chicago jazz (and featured Jimmy Mcpartland, Jimmy Teschemacher, Joe Sullivan, and Gene Krupa). After organizing some other record sessions, Condon switched to guitar, moved to New York in 1929, worked with Red Nichols' Five Pennies and Red Mckenzie's Blue Blowers, and recorded in several settings, including with Louis Armstrong (1929) and The Rhythm Makers (1932). During 1936-1937, he co-led a band with Joe Marsala.

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