Rozelle Claxton
American jazz pianist (1913-1995)
Rozelle Claxton (February 5, 1913, Bartlett, Tennessee – March 30, 1995, Lake Forest, Illinois) was an American jazz pianist and arranger.
Claxton learned the piano at the age of 11 and started playing professionally with Clarence Davis by the age of 17, whose band was working with W.C. Handy. He played and arranged for Harlan Leonard and played solo in Chicago in the 1930s. Following this he played with Ernie Fields and Eddie South, and had a short stint as a substitute pianist in Count Basie's orchestra. Later in the 1940s he played with Walter Fuller, George Dixon, Earl Hines, Red Norvo, Jimmie Lunceford, and Andy Kirk. In the 1950s he did much work accompanying vocalists, including Pearl Bailey. He worked with Franz Jackson from 1959 well into the 1960s, in addition to continuing solo appearances in Chicago as an organist and pianist.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2171231. VIAF identifies the subject as 4619475. The Library of Congress control number is no2003053465. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1913, 1995 and 1959.
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This entry incorporates text from “Rozelle Claxton” 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.