North Omaha Jazz and R&B: The 24th Street Legacy
When people think of American jazz and rhythm and blues, they usually think of New Orleans, Kansas City, Chicago, Memphis or Harlem. But for much of the twentieth century, North Omaha – and especially the business district along North 24th Street – was one of the Midwest's important stops for Black music. Touring legends played its ballroom, local bandleaders trained young players, and musicians raised in the neighborhood went on to work with Count Basie, Jimi Hendrix, Ray Charles and Motown's biggest stars. Several of them are members of the Nebraska Music Hall of Fame.
North 24th Street and the Near North Side
In the first half of the twentieth century, Omaha's Near North Side became the center of the city's African American community. North 24th Street was its main street, lined with shops, churches, restaurants, clubs and professional offices. Omaha was a railroad and meatpacking city, and those industries drew workers – and audiences – from across the country. Music was part of daily life: in churches, dance halls, taverns and homes.
The area around 24th and Lake Streets is today recognized as a historic district, a reminder that this corner was once one of the busiest entertainment destinations between Chicago and Denver.
The Dreamland Ballroom
The best-known venue on North 24th Street was the Dreamland Ballroom, on the second floor of the Jewell Building at 2221–2225 North 24th Street. The building was built in 1923 by James Jewell Sr., an influential figure in Omaha's Black community, with commercial space on the ground floor and a ballroom upstairs that could hold a large dance band and a crowded dance floor.
For more than forty years, from the 1920s into the 1960s, Dreamland drew nationally known performers traveling between the big cities. Among the artists who appeared there were Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, Nat "King" Cole, Lionel Hampton, Dizzy Gillespie, Earl Hines, Dinah Washington, Sarah Vaughan and Ray Charles. The Jewell Building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a City of Omaha landmark; today the Great Plains Black History Museum occupies one of its storefronts.
Territory Bands and a Training Ground
In the 1930s and 1940s much of the country was served by "territory bands" – professional dance orchestras based in regional cities that toured small towns and ballrooms across several states. Omaha was home to well-known territory bands, including those led by Lloyd Hunter and Nat Towles, and they gave young local musicians the chance to learn to read charts, play a long night of dance music and survive life on the road.
That training paid off. A saxophonist who came up in this world could move on to the famous name bands, and several Omaha players did exactly that. Preston Love, for example, played in the bands of Nat Towles and Lloyd Hunter, as well as Snub Mosley, Lucky Millinder and Fats Waller, before he joined Count Basie.
Omaha Voices That Went National
Wynonie Harris
Wynonie Harris, born in Omaha in 1915, started out as a dancer before becoming one of the most powerful "blues shouters" of the 1940s and early 1950s. Recording for King Records, he had fifteen Top 10 rhythm and blues hits between 1946 and 1952. His 1948 version of Roy Brown's "Good Rockin' Tonight" is often named among the first rock and roll records, and Elvis Presley recorded the song for Sun Records in 1954. Harris was inducted into the Nebraska Music Hall of Fame in 1998.
Preston Love
Preston Love (1921–2004) became one of the most respected alto saxophonists of the big-band era. He played with Count Basie from 1945 to 1947 – including on Basie's No. 1 hit "Open the Door, Richard" – and later led the Preston Love Orchestra, described on his Hall of Fame page as the top orchestra in the Midwest for several years. After moving to California in 1962 he became a busy studio player and led the West Coast band for Motown artists such as the Supremes, the Temptations, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. He later returned to Omaha, kept performing and told his story in the memoir A Thousand Honey Creeks Later: A Life in Music from Basie to Motown (1997).
Buddy Miles and the Rich brothers
Buddy Miles, born in Omaha in 1947, started playing drums as a boy in his father George Miles' band, the Bebops. He went on to co-found the Electric Flag, lead the Buddy Miles Express and play in Jimi Hendrix's Band of Gypsys. His Omaha circle included Herbie Rich and Billy Rich, from a musical family whose sibling group, the Seven Wonders, was a fine local rhythm and blues band in the late 1950s. According to his Hall of Fame biography, Herbie Rich formed a band called the New Breed in North Omaha in 1963–64 with Stemsy Hunter and others who later worked nationally; Herbie and Stemsy both joined Miles in the Electric Flag.
From R&B to Rock: the 1960s
By the 1960s the rhythm and blues tradition of North Omaha fed directly into the city's rock and soul scene. Teen clubs such as Sandy's Escape featured local bands, and Omaha radio played regional records alongside national hits (see how Omaha gave birth to Top 40 radio). Horn-driven show bands across the Midwest borrowed heavily from the R&B sound, a story told in the Midwest horn band era.
The late 1960s were also a difficult time for North 24th Street. Civil unrest, economic change and later the construction of the North Freeway through the neighborhood all contributed to the decline of the old business district, and many of the clubs that had once lined the street closed.
Remembering the Legacy Today
Efforts to preserve North Omaha's musical heritage have continued. In 2005, a non-profit arts center named in Preston Love's honor, Love's Jazz & Arts Center, opened at 2510 North 24th Street. After fifteen years it lost its lease at that location in 2020, and in 2021 a new organization, the North Omaha Music and Arts Center (NOMA), opened in the space. The Jewell Building still stands as a reminder of the Dreamland years.
If you visit, take time to walk the 24th Street corridor, look for historical markers, and check current opening hours for museums and arts centers before you go – programs and schedules change. Our guide to Nebraska music history sites lists other places worth seeing.
Meet the North Omaha inductees. Read the Hall of Fame pages for Wynonie Harris, Preston Love and Buddy Miles, then explore the full list of inductees by year.
Conclusion
North 24th Street gave Omaha a musical identity that reached far beyond Nebraska. The Dreamland Ballroom brought the greatest names in jazz to town, local territory bands trained a generation of players, and Omaha natives like Wynonie Harris, Preston Love and Buddy Miles carried that sound to national stages. Their stories are an essential chapter in the history of Nebraska music – and in the history of American rhythm and blues.