Dickerson, Roger Quincey "R. Q."
(born: 1898 - died: 1951)Roger Q. Dickerson was born January 5, 1898 in Paducah, KY, and grew up in St. Louis, MO.
During the day, R. Q. was a barber as early as 1910; in 1919 he was listed on p. 1473 in Gould's St. Louis Red-Blue Book.
Dickerson played trumpet with several groups at the Cotton Club in New York, beginning with Robinson's Bostonians in the early 1920s and ending with Cab Calloway's Orchestra in 1931. He remained in New York, working as a cab driver.
In 1935, he was listed as a musician and part-owner of Weeks-Dickerson Body Shop in Glens Falls, NY, on p. 59 of Manning's Glens Falls Directory for year Beginning June 1, 1935. Dickerson continued to be listed in the directory as a musician until 1937.
He can be heard playing on the recordings Early Black Swing, Prohibition Blues, and Riverboat Shuffle.
For more see "R. Q. Dickerson" in Classic Jazz: the musicians and recordings that shaped jazz, 1895-1933, by S. Yanow; and in the Oxford Music Online Database.