Green Book, Jazz Landmarks

Standard Theater

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A stop on the “Chitlin Circuit,” the Standard Theater was owned by African American entrepreneur John T. Gibson.

Standard Theater - Feature

Standard Theatre

From ExplorePAHistory.com

In 1914, Gibson bought the Standard Theatre on the 1100 block of South Street. His timing couldn’t have been better, for in the following years, tens of thousands of southern blacks would pour into the city of Philadelphia as part of the Great Migration unleashed by the First World War.

Young men and women, with good jobs and money in their pockets, flocked to Gibson’s Standard Theatre to see a fare of “High Class and Meritorious Vaudeville,” stage shows, and popular music. The Standard became a regular stop for Black performers on their national tours: comedians Bylow and Ashes, singers Bessie Smith and Ethel Waters, Erma C. Miller’s Brown Skinned Models, popularly known as the “Black Rockettes,” and jazz bands led by Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington.

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Jazz Landmarks, Lee Morgan

Earle Theater

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The Earle Theater was a stop on the “Chitlin’ Circuit.” It was the most expensive theater ever built in Philadelphia. The Earle had an ornate interior and exterior and seating for 2,700. It was demolished in July 1953.

Earle Theater

In an interview with the Smithsonian Oral History Project, Philly native and NEA Jazz Master Benny Golson talked about how he was inspired to master the saxophone after seeing Lionel Hampton and Arnett Cobb at the Earle Theater:

I guess they usually went until 9 or 10 at night, which meant that they had about three or four shows a day. It was an ongoing thing. Week after week they’d have whatever band was popular. Benny Goodman, Woody Herman, anything. Charlie Spivak, Claude Thornhill, Tommy Dorsey. Any band that was popular, they would bring there. It was an ongoing thing. Count Basie, Duke Ellington. They all came there.

The reason I went is because I was in high school – Benjamin Franklin High School. The kids were coming back and says, “Oh man. You got to go to the Earle Theater and hear Lionel Hampton. You got to hear him play Flying Home.” Blah blah blah blah. So one day I didn’t go to school. I went there. That’s when I heard him. That’s when my life changed. That’s when I heard Arnett Cobb. Incidentally, years later – many years later – it must have been 50 years later – I happened to see him in Nice, France. I said, “You’re the reason that I play the saxophone.” He says, “I never knew that. Really?” I said, “Yes.” He had tears in his eyes, because he knew who I was. I said, “I hear you play, and that’s when my life changed.”

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Advocacy, Jazz Landmarks

Philadelphia Jazz History Mosaic

NetworkArts was invited by The Free Library of Philadelphia to create after school arts programming in ten North Philadelphia library branches over a two-year period. Partnering with the Philadelphia Clef Club, NetworkArts offered programs in jazz history, lectures, demonstrations and poetry.

The collages of Romare Bearden were studied, and students created sculptures and plaques commemorating 75 important jazz artists who worked, lived, or were born in Philadelphia. During installation, Project HOME and over 200 neighborhood residents participated. The Philadelphia Clef Club Junior Ensemble performed during the community installation day.

Jazz Landmarks

Giant Steps Mosaic

Giant Steps depicts seven key album covers, tracing John Coltrane’s career from his work with Miles Davis to his own compositions, and his great masterpiece A Love Supreme. Each mosaic was preceded by a multimedia educational program presented by the John Coltrane Cultural Society.

Jazz Landmarks

Ridge on the Rise Mural

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This storytelling mural includes Cecil B. Moore, community members protesting at Girard College, and the Pearl Theatre where jazz greats like John Coltrane and Blanche Calloway performed.

In the mural, the art deco facade of the long gone theatre contrasts with the forbidding ten-foot stone wall that still encloses the grounds of Girard College, site of the landmark civil rights struggle.

Girard College Historical Marker

Cultural Heritage Preservation, Jazz Landmarks

Uptown Theater

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Opened on February 16, 1929, the Uptown began life as a movie house. In the 1950s, it became a music venue. Jazz, blues and soul greats who graced the Uptown stage included Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan, Gloria Lynne, Ray Charles, James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Cannonball Adderley, Nancy Wilson, Ramsey Lewis, Oscar Brown, Jr., Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, and Jimmy Smith.

Miles Davis played here one Christmas Day, but after the first show, he left because of the small crowd.


In 1958, legendary disc jockey Georgie Woods began producing rhythm & blues shows at the Uptown. The 2,040-seat theater became a stop on the “chitlin’ circuit.” The Uptown was where jazz met R&B.

Saxophonist Sam Reed was the house bandleader. The Sam Reed Orchestra included Bootsie Barnes, Jimmy Heath and Odean Pope.


The Uptown’s heyday was the 1960s and ‘70s. Since the final curtain in 1978, the interior of the Uptown has deteriorated almost beyond recognition. With the exception of the seats, none of the original artifacts remain.

Uptown Theater

For information on how you can help restore this Art Deco palace to its former glory and preserve an iconic piece of Black music, visit the Uptown Entertainment & Development Corporation.

Jazz Landmarks

Uptown Reunion Mural

Artist: Peter Pagast

This mural celebrates the musical heritage and cultural influence of the Uptown Theater, which opened in the late 1920s as a movie palace and live-performance venue. The musical careers of Ray Charles, the Jackson 5 and the Temptations, among others, were launched here. The mural also highlights Georgie Woods, “The Man with the Goods,” who used his airtime and celebrity to advocate for civil rights.

Jazz Landmarks

John Coltrane Apartment

From Hidden City Philadelphia:

When 18 year old John Coltrane moved to Philadelphia, in 1943 the nation’s third largest city, he entered a fundamentally different world from his hometown of High Point, N.C. Like many African-Americans who migrated to major cities of the North, Coltrane joined older family members and friends already settled there. They lived in an apartment at 1450 N. 12th Street between Jefferson and Master Streets in an area since demolished for the Yorktown Urban Renewal project.

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Jazz Landmarks

John Coltrane House

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In 1952, at the age of twenty-six, with the benefit of a G.I. loan, John Coltrane bought for himself, his mother, his aunt and his first cousin the North 33rd Street property. Coltrane lived here from 1952 until 1958. It was a big, rowhouse, built for a well-to-do middle class at the turn of the 19th century and a huge step up from the cramped quarters in a deteriorating area of town where the family had been living. Coltrane owned and lived in this home longer than any other during his legendary career as a composer and saxophonist.

In 1999, the John Coltrane House was designated a National Historic Landmark, a recognition accorded to places that have “exceptional value or quality in illustrating or interpreting the heritage of the United States.”

John Coltrane Historical Marker

The recognition attests to the value of the house. The building is structurally sound but it needs some repairs. Money is needed to preserve the John Coltrane House for current and future generations.

For information on how you can help, contact the John Coltrane House.