Storyville was shut down during World War I, sending the Jazz musicians up the Mississippi river in search of employment and spreading Jazz to cities on the river and to Chicago and New York. In 1917 The Original Dixieland Jazz Band released the first Jazz record. It became one of the first records to sell a million copies. James Reese Europe is cited in books about ragtime and early jazz as the most respected black bandleader of the 'teens', but he should also be recognized among World War I historians because of his musical compositions inspired by wartime experiences, and the achievements of his band known as the 369th U.S. Infantry "Hell Fighters" Band. Recordings made by Europe's band in early 1919, within weeks of the men's return to the States, are finally being reissued on compact disc. Music of the 1920’s
As the decade began, the spring-wound talking machine with pre-electrical, no-fidelity sound was already established and probably the most popular of the home
entertainment devices; the best selling makes were the Victrola and the Graphanola. Radio stations were mushrooming across the United States in the 1920s. On September 9,1922,

Fiddlin' John Carson made his radio debut, one of the first country music performers to modulate the airwaves. The Grand Ole Opry, originally known as the WSM Barn Dance, made its first broadcast on November 28, 1925. In the 1920s Ma Rainey , "The Mother of the Blues", became a featured performer on the T.O.B.A (Theater Owners Booking Association) circuit. Before signing a recording contract with Paramount Records in 1923, Rainey had almost a quarter century's worth of stage work to her credit. Bessie Smith was the greatest and most influential classic blues singer of the 1920s. During her heyday she earned upwards of $2000 per week, a queenly sum in the 20s. King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band was the first black Jazz combo to be heard on a label with national distribution in 1923. In the early 1920s Louis Armstrong joined King Oliver in Chicago - playing solos with Fletcher Henderson at the Roseland Ballroom in New York and making jazz history with the Hot Five. Sippie Wallace was born in Texas and carried with her a tradition of Texas-styled blues that emphasized risque` lyrics and rough-cut, rural vocal phrasing rather than the sophisticated accents of the era's more cosmopolitan blues singers. Although her recording career stretched throughout most of the '20s, her best work was done from 1923 to 1927 when the likes of Louis Armstrong, Johnny Dodds, Sidney Bechet, and Clarence Williams accompanied her in the recording studio.