Artist: Buddy Boudreaux

John Landry “Buddy” Boudreaux was a big band and jazz musician in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and played saxophone and clarinet. From 1934, he directed and played in a number of bands that have toured the southern United States, and drew nationally known performers to Baton Rouge.

Those groups specialized in the swing music popular in the United States in the 1920s, ‘30s and ‘40s, when big bands criss-crossed the country to perform. Those nationwide tours became unprofitable in later decades as younger audiences turned to rock music. “However, the public had not lost its taste for swing or an evening of dancing,” Jazz Society reported, “and this spawned the growth of regional big bands, like Boudreaux’s Buddy Lee Orchestra, groups of top-notch musicians who only play locally.”

The 16-piece Buddy Lee Orchestra was co-founded in 1973 by Boudreaux and Lee Fortier, a trumpet-playing friend from their days in the youth orchestra. It was the best known of Boudreaux's bands. In 1986, the Buddy Lee Orchestra alternated sets with Buddy Rich’s big band during a Baton Rouge performance billed as the Buddy Buddy Concert.