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Up a Lazy River

Elmer Snowden

Elmer Snowden

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A banjo solo filmed sometime during the 1960s featuring Elmer Snowden, original leader of "The Washingtonians" a band that later became the "Duke Ellington Orchestra".

Elmer Snowden was born on Octobr 9th 1900 in Baltimore, Maryland where he started out as a banjoist active at the local dance halls. Traveling to New York in 1923 as leader of a group from Washington, D.C. the "Washington Black Sox Orchestra" (which became "The Washingtonians") he soon hired Duke Ellington who would eventually take control of the band. Snowden was reportedly voted out after a disagreement over unpaid wadges in 1924.