Charles Joseph “Buddy” Bolden (September 6, 1877 – November 4, 1931) was an American cornetist who was regarded by contemporaries as a key figure in the development of a New Orleans style of ragtime music, or “jass”, which later came to be known as jazz.

Bolden’s father, Westmore Bolden, worked as a “driver” for William Walker, the former master of Buddy’s grandfather Gustavus Bolden (who died in 1866) at the time of Buddy’s birth; his mother, Alice (née Harris), was 18 on August 14, 1873, when she married Westmore (who was around 25 at the time, as records indicate he was 19 in August 1866). His father died when Buddy was six, after which the boy lived with his mother and family members. In records of the period the family name is variously spelled Bolen, Bolding, Boldan, and Bolden, thus complicating research. Buddy likely attended Fisk School in New Orleans, though evidence is circumstantial, as early records of this and other local schools are missing.

One of the most famous Bolden numbers is “Funky Butt” (later known as “Buddy Bolden’s Blues”), which represents one of the earliest references to the concept of funk in popular music. Bolden’s “Funky Butt” was, as Danny Barker once put it, a reference to the olfactory effect of an auditorium packed full of sweaty people “dancing close together and belly rubbing.” “Funky Butt” was one of many in the Bolden repertory with rude or off-color lyrics popular in some of the rougher places where he played; Bolden’s trombonist Willy Cornish claimed authorship. It became so well known as a rude song that even whistling the melody on a public street was considered offensive. The melody was incorporated into an early published ragtime number, “St. Louis Tickle.”^{[citation needed]}

Bolden is also credited with the invention of the “Big Four”, a key rhythmic innovation on the marching band beat, which gave embryonic jazz much more room for individual improvisation. As Wynton Marsalis explains, the big four (below) was the first syncopated bass drum pattern to deviate from the standard on-the-beat march. The second half of the Big Four is the pattern commonly known as the hambone rhythm developed from sub-Saharan African music traditions.