I was once told that they changed their name from "Jass" to "Jazz" because naughty people (this was 1917) liked to go around and cover up the "j" on their posters and flyers.
Thank god they found this old film footage showing nothing but a still of the record cover. The guy who used more than 3 minutes of expensive film material for this also deserves respect!
Apparently the original term..."jass music" referred to music played in New Orleans bordellos ..."jass" was an old word for sex. Later cleaned up by changing to "jazz".
I have this recording. It's a 78 rpm and I listened to it all through my childhood and loved it. I was born in 1948 and it didn't seem like such an important item in the 1950's.
In 1917, jazz music had only just arrived in Britain. When this band performed in front of King George V that year, he was impressed, having not heard that kind of music before.
My great grandmother played this tune in 1919 when she lived in New Orleans during the Axeman Murders scare. He sent a letter saying that everyone play jazz music or he’d kill that night whoever didn’t. The town didn’t believe it but was still scared and the whole town played jazz that night. She said she’d never forget this song cause it’s all she played that night. So weird