Henry James “Red” Allen, Jr. (January 7, 1908 – April 17, 1967) was an American jazz trumpeter and vocalist whose playing has been claimed by Joachim-Ernst Berendt and others as the first to fully incorporate the innovations of Louis Armstrong.

Allen was born in the Algiers neighborhood of New Orleans, Louisiana, the son of the bandleader Henry Allen Sr. He took early trumpet lessons from Peter Bocage and Manuel Manetta.

Allen’s career began in Sidney Desvigne‘s Southern Syncopators. He was playing professionally by 1924 with the Excelsior Brass Band and the jazz dance bands of Sam Morgan, George Lewis and John Casimir. After playing on riverboats on the Mississippi River, he went to Chicago in 1927 to join King Oliver‘s band. Around this time he made recordings on the side in the band of Clarence Williams.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W022m4oRLr4