                          KANSAS CITY  

There was great activity in Kansas City from the early 1920s to about 1938. A political organization known as the Pendergast Machine did much more than encourage the nightclub atmosphere, and so there was an abundance of employment opportunities for jazz musicians. The influx showed that Kansas City had become a jazz mecca: there was Bill Basie from Red Bank, New Jersey; Ben Webster from Tulsa; Lester Young from Mississippi; and Andy Kirk from Dallas. The Benny Moten band was considered to be the top band in the Kansas City area from about 1926 to 1935, but the competition was extremely keen from the bands of Andy Kirk (piano and arrangements by Mary Lou Williams), Walter Page, Alphonso Trent, and others. The Kansas City bands were looser in musical setting and relied heavily on blues-based riffs.  
