Jimmy Ryan's was a jazz club in New York City, located at 53 West 52nd Street, Manhattan, from 1934 to 1962, and 154 West 54th Street from 1962 to 1983.John S. Wilson, "Jimmy Ryan's, A Shrine to the Same Old Jazz", The New York Times, September 24, 1976 It was a venue for performances of Dixieland jazz.Jazz A-Z, by Peter Clayton & Peter Gammond, Guinness Books (Guinness Superlatives Ltd.) (1986); .
History The location on 52nd Street, Manhattan, New York City, was one of a row of brownstones with clubs operating in basements. As the last surviving jazz club on 52nd Street, its brownstone – along with all the other brownstones on the north side of the street – were demolished in 1962 to make way for construction of the new CBS Building. CBS had given Jimmy Ryan $9,000 to relocate.Bill Crow, Jazz Anecdotes: Second Time Around, p. 116, Oxford University Press (2005) Arnold Shaw, 52nd Street, The Street of Jazz, p. 242, Da Capo Press (1977, 1983)
The club was owned by partners Matthew C. (Matty) Walsh (1914–2006) and Jimmy Ryan (1911–1963). Walsh, Ryan's brother-in-law, continued ownership following Ryan's death in July 1963 at the French Hospital. Gilbert J. Pincus (1907–1980) – who served as doorman from 1942 to 1962 at the original location and from about 1963 until his death in 1980 – became known as the "Mayor of 52nd Street".John S. Wilson, "Gilbert J. Pincus, 73, Jazz Club Doorman and Mayor of 52nd Street," The New York Times, February 7, 1980Biography Index, A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines. Volume 12: September 1979 – August 1982, H.W. Wilson Co., New York (1983) Arnold Shaw, The Street That Never Slept, New York's Fabled 52d St. McCann & Geoghegan, New York (1971) .
Jazz style During the 1940s, three New York nightclubs stood out as centers for traditional style jazz: Jimmy Ryan's, Nick's in Greenwich Village, and Eddie Condon's, just a few blocks away.William P. Gottlieb, The Golden Age of Jazz, p. 13, Pomegranate Communications, Inc. (1995).
Performing artists Resident musicians in the 1940s
Mezz Mezzrow (1943) James P. Johnson (1943) Art Hodes (1945–1949) J. C. Higginbotham (1946) Henry "Red" Allen (1946) Sidney De Paris (1947–1957) Sidney Bechet (1948) Max Kaminsky (1948–1949) Wilbur De Paris (1951–1962) Zutty Singleton (1963–1970) Roy Eldridge (1970–1980)
Musicians of the Sunday jam sessions, organized and managed by Milt Gabler
Sidney Bechet Pops Foster Hot Lips Page Pee Wee Russell Eddie Condon Mezz Mezzrow Kaiser Marshall Hank Duncan Sandy Williams Brad Gowans Ben Webster Chu Berry Coleman Hawkins Wildcats
Songs and albums related to the club
Tony Parenti and his Dean's of Dixieland: A Night at Jimmy Ryan's (Jazzology, 1967) with Max Kaminsky, Conrad Janis, Davis Quinn, Joe Henshaw, and Zutty Singleton "Down at Jimmy Ryan's", a renamed version of Theodore Morse and Edward Madden's "Down in Jungletown" "Blues for Jimmy Ryan" Live at Jimmy's, a complete album recorded live there by Maynard Ferguson in 1973
References