Alvin Burroughs
American musician (1911-1950)

Alvin Burroughs (November 21, 1911 – August 1, 1950) was an American swing jazz drummer.
Burroughs played in Kansas City with Walter Page's Blue Devils in 1928–29 and then with Alphonse Trent's territory band in 1930.
Moving to Chicago, he played with Hal Draper's Arcadians (1935), Horace Henderson (July 1937–38), and Earl Hines (September 1938–40); with Hines he recorded extensively. In the early 1940s he worked with Milt Larkin's band at the Rhumboogie Club, Benny Carter (late 1942), and Red Allen (late 1944–April 46), in addition to leading his own band. He was in George Dixon's quartet in 1950 when he died of a heart attack. He never recorded as a leader.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Alvin Burroughs” as american musician (1911-1950). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american musician (1911-1950). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 23, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q449051. VIAF identifies the subject as 417149106369168492840. The Library of Congress control number is n94120288. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1911, 1950, 1928 and 1930.
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This entry incorporates text from “Alvin Burroughs” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.