Abe Lyman

Abe Lyman's California Orchestra was a pioneering West Coast jazz band, perhaps the only 1920s Los Angeles-based dance band that managed to achieve national recognition while remaining at home. Brothers Abe and Mike Lyman (originally "Lymon") were natives of Chicago. Mike left Chicago for Los Angeles during the First World War; when, in the role of entrepreneur, he needed a dance band to play the Sunset Inn in Santa Monica in 1918, he brought Abe out to lead it. Over the course of the next three years, the band built up an impressive roster of players, many from New Orleans --...