It’s a building with a long and seedy history, but there’s an uplifting side to its story as well.
Today, the structure at the corner of Bienville and Crozat streets sits empty, as it has since 2023, when the convenience store operating there was shut down by Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams for being a hot spot of criminal activity.
Such notoriety dates at least to its 1914 incarnation as a saloon run by a known criminal, Frank P. Early, at the center of the then-legal prostitution district commonly called Storyville.
But more on point to this story, the saloon also was a performance venue for a popular, innovative and influential pianist and composer who within two years would publish what would become a national hit ragtime song, “Pretty Baby.”
His name was Tony Jackson (1882-1921), and he was the son of formerly enslaved parents. During the Storyville era, Jackson became a popular musician both for his hot piano arrangements and his elegant signing, which pianist and composer Jelly Roll Morton, an acolyte of Jackson’s, recalled in 1938:
“Tony Jackson was a favorite among all. He had such a beautiful voice and such a marvelous range. His range on a blues tune would be just exactly like a blues singer. On an opera tune would be just exactly like an opera singer. And he was always one of the first with the latest tunes.”
Speaking to historian William Russell, red-light district pianist Rosalind Johnson concurred. She recalled that “Tony Jackson was the greatest. There couldn’t no one touch him. Not even Jelly (Morton). He was somebody.”
A typical building style
Unlike the singular talents it hosted, the now-rundown salon building is typical of many late-19th-century corner businesses found in New Orleans neighborhoods. The front door’s orientation faces the corner, with commercial space occupying the first floor. The second floor was used as residential space or as storage.
On the exterior, the building has a wraparound, second-floor gallery, with brackets under the roofline and square medallions on the corner of the gallery facade. Three original windows open to the gallery on each side, though one has been added to the Bienville street side.
Pairs of tall French doors, which once opened to each street-facing side of the first floor, have long since been covered over. Gone, too, are the turned columns that once supported the gallery.
Leaving New Orleans
In 1915, the great migration of Southern Black people to Northern and Western population centers was under way. Relocating to Chicago, Tony Jackson enjoyed vastly better pay and living conditions and relief from Jim Crow laws.
But there likely was another consideration as well: Jackson was an out gay man. Though there was a gay community in New Orleans, there were not many others spaces a gay Black man could feel safe or welcome.
Recalling Jackson’s sexuality and his move to Chicago, Jelly Roll Morton noted, “Tony Jackson liked the freedom that was there.”
In 1916, Jackson’s composition “Pretty Baby” was published to great success. It was used in numerous Broadway and London stage productions and was recorded by artists at Edison and Victor records that same year.
Morton said Jackson “went to Chicago and became a favorite there.” But Jackson’s Chicago heyday was cut short by failing health. He died there in 1921 of liver disease.
Jackson, like so many early 20th-century New Orleans music pioneers, never recorded. His legacy exists in his compositions and the testimonials of those who heard him perform.
And there is the vacant building at Crozat and Bienville streets where, in 1914, Tony Jackson’s hot music echoed through the din of Frank Early’s Saloon.
Fun facts
- Yes, the 1978 Louis Malle film “Pretty Baby” starring Brooke Shields and Susan Sarandon takes its name from Jackson’s song.
- Remarkably, over 110 years after its debut in the bars and bordellos of New Orleans, “Pretty Baby” is still performed by musicians around the world.
- More than a music pioneer, Tony Jackson in 2011 was inducted into the Chicago Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame.
- Listen to a 1916 player-piano roll of “Pretty Baby” here.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.nola.com ’
