[Dixielandjazz] Why guitar and not banjo?

[Steve Barbone]

Dan Hardie <darnhard at ozemail.com.au> wrote

> Hi Bob,
> Louis Lince seems to have answered your question about the Bolden Band.
> The photo Louis refers to  is on my Loudest Trumpet  web page - the
> right way round! Most jazz Bands in New Orleans appear to have  used
> the guitar until the 1920's, when the banjo became popular. It is
> strange because historically the banjo was the instrument of the slaves
> - even the street bands in New Orleans employed guitarists like Brock
> Mumford, not much evidence of banjos.

Perhaps they used guitar because ALL of the early Jazz Bands were primarily
Dance Bands? Just a guess on my part, but to me it seems that guitar would
be better in a Dance Band than Banjo. Then too, banjo was associated with
Minstrels and maybe the Dance/Jazz Bands didn't particularly want that sort
of an image?

The Buddy Bolden photo that Dan's book shows correctly, is also shown
correctly in the Ken Burns book on Jazz.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone