Kelly's band Early gigs : Kelly's first professional engagement was in Seattle Washington, around 1896. He moved to San Francisco around 1899.
San Francisco : In 1914, Kelly was in
Art Hickman's band playing tea dances in the Rose Room of the
St. Francis Hotel in
San Francisco. Kelly eventually formed his own band and moved it to Chicago in 1914.
Chicago : Kelly's band in Chicago included notable early
New Orleans jazz musicians, including
Alcide Nunez,
Tom Brown,
Gussie Mueller,
Emile Christian, and Ragbaby Stephens.
Early use of the word "jazz" Kelly claimed that his band, Bert Kelly's Jazz Band, was the first to publish the word "jazz" in 1915. • In 1914, use of the word "jass" (forerunner to the word "jazz") was forbidden in mixed company in Chicago. Just before winning the Chicago mayoral election in late 1914,
Bill Thompson's first police chief ordered
Bert Kelly's Stables — the first "joint" on
Rush Street — to take down a painted banner advertising "Jass Music." And, public opinion approved. • In the fall of 1915, Kelly's band had been performing at the College Inn in Chicago. Kelly was directing and playing drums, Wheeler Wadsworth
(né Frank Wheeler Wadsworth; 1889–1929) was on saxophone; William Ahearn was on piano, and Sam Baum was on drums. Paraphrasing a 1919 newsprint article by a journalist who chronicled jazz, Walter J. Kingsley (1876–1929), the band played blues, hesitations, and quaint
syncopated melodies, and were quite the craze in the night life of Chicago.
Thomas Meighan, a movie star, gave a party one night and hired the Kelly band for dance music. The guests included
Emmy Wehlen,
Julian Eltinge,
Jeanne Eagels, and
Grace George.
Richard Travers filmed it. In a segment showing the musicians, he inserted the caption, "The Originators of Jazz." Thereafter, Kelly's band was known as a "jazz band." • In a 1973 article, Dick Holbrook, a researcher, refuted Kelly's claim and challenged Kingsley's published account. == Kelly as a jazz club entrepreneur ==