Jim Cullum Jr.: A Legacy in Jazz Music (1941–2019)
Published: July 9, 2023
Updated: July 9, 2023
James Albert “Jim” Cullum, Jr., jazz musician, bandleader, and jazz historian, was born to James A. Cullum, Sr., and Mary Conoly (Prendergast) Cullum on September 20, 1941, in Dallas, Texas. His father’s profession as a big band musician and his occasional jam sessions at home with such jazz stars as Bobby Hackett and Jack Teagarden provided early inspiration for Cullum Jr. When the family moved to San Antonio in 1953, Cullum Sr., settled into steady work as a wholesale grocer. Cullum Jr. expanded his musical appreciation through his father’s large collection of 78 rpm records. His discoveries included the jazz of Bix Beiderbecke, Louis Armstrong, and King Oliver. At age fourteen he purchased an old cornet at a pawn shop and taught himself to play. He performed in a small jazz band while he attended Alamo Heights High School, and his growing passion inspired his father to return to music.
After graduation Jim Cullum, Jr., married and joined his father’s grocery business in 1960, but soon father and son, yearning to return to music, established the Happy Jazz Band in 1962. The following year they partnered with a group of investors to open a night club—The Landing—on San Antonio’s River Walk. With the wave of tourism brought on by the HemisFair in 1968, the Cullums sold their grocery business and focused on performing full-time at The Landing.
After the death of Jim Cullum, Sr., in 1973, Jim Jr. took over as bandleader and renamed the ensemble The Jim Cullum Jazz Band. They maintained a regular schedule of performances five to six nights a week as well as touring various jazz festivals across the nation. Cullum established his American Jazz label, which produced a prolific output of recordings.
In the late 1980s Cullum developed the Riverwalk Jazz program that was eventually syndicated on National Public Radio to more than 200 stations nationally and internationally. The show featured live jazz performances by Cullum’s band along with guest artists and stories detailing the early history of jazz. New programs of Riverwalk Jazz were recorded to 2012. Described as a “jazz scholar,” Cullum maintained a large archive of jazz sheet music, books, and recordings. In later years he also conducted music workshops and served as president of the San Francisco Traditional Jazz Foundation.
His career of almost sixty years served as a lynchpin for jazz in San Antonio, and he shared the stage with such luminaries as Louis Armstrong, Pete Fountain, Benny Goodman, Joe Venuti, Jack Teagarden, and Doc Severinsen. After selling The Landing in 2009, Cullum and his band continued to perform regularly at several venues in town. He was honored at the 2016 Distinction in the Arts awards ceremony in San Antonio.
Jim Cullum, Jr., married several times, including to Susan Estelle Kelso (1960), Blanquita E. Walsh (1974), Beverly R. Helms (1987), and Christina Anne Zuelzer (2005). Cullum died of a heart attack at his home in San Antonio on August 11, 2019. He was survived by at least six children. His memorial service was held at the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts in San Antonio. Some of his bandmates carried on as the Riverwalk Alumni Jazz Band.
Bibliography:
Guide to the Riverwalk Jazz Collection ARS.0129, Online Archive of California (https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/c8222vcv/), accessed July 3, 2023. Sterlin Holmesly, “Texas Jazz Veterans: A Collection of Oral History,” The Journal of Texas Music History (2006). The Jim Cullum Riverwalk Jazz Collection (https://riverwalkjazz.stanford.edu/), accessed July 3, 2023. San Antonio Express-News, August 12, 14, 2019.
Categories:
Time Periods:
Places:
The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this entry.
Laurie E. Jasinski, “Cullum, James Albert, Jr.,” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed March 09, 2026, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/cullum-james-albert-jr.
Published by the Texas State Historical Association.
TID:
FCULL
All copyrighted materials included within the Handbook of Texas Online are in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 related to Copyright and “Fair Use” for Non-Profit educational institutions, which permits the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA), to utilize copyrighted materials to further scholarship, education, and inform the public. The TSHA makes every effort to conform to the principles of fair use and to comply with copyright law.
For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
- July 9, 2023
- July 9, 2023
This entry belongs to the following special projects:
