Louis Jordan, born July 8, 1908, in Brinkley, Arkansas, was one of the state's brightest musical stars, dominating the rhythm and blues charts during the World War II era with hits including "Choo Choo Ch'Boogie," "Let the Good Times Roll," "Is You Is or Is You Ain't (My Baby)," and "Beans and Cornbread." With his Tympany Five combo, which he fronted for more than twenty years, he developed an infectious, readily identifiable shuffle rhythm widely regarded as the foundation of what would become American rock n' roll music. He studied music under his father, a member of the traveling Rabbit Foot Minstrels, quickly learned the clarinet, played piano early in his career, and made alto saxophone his main instrument, but became best known as a songwriter, entertainer, and vocalist. As one of the first black recording artists to achieve significant crossover popularity with mainstream American audiences, he scored simultaneous Top Ten hits on the pop and rhythm and blues charts on several occasions. Although he began performing big band swing jazz, he became famous as a leading practitioner, innovator, and popularizer of jump blues, a swinging, up-tempo, dance-oriented hybrid of jazz, blues, and boogie-woogie. He was also an actor and a major black film personality who appeared in dozens of soundies, made numerous cameos in mainstream features and short films including the highly successful Caldonia, and had feature films made especially for him such as Beware! in 1946 and Look Out Sister in 1948. A prolific songwriter, he wrote or co-wrote many songs that became influential classics of twentieth-century popular music, and songs he made famous later appeared on the soundtracks of many contemporary movies, in advertising campaigns, and at the core of the hit Broadway musical revue Five Guys Named Moe. Numerous performers, including B.B. King, James Brown, Chuck Berry, Bill Haley, and Ray Charles, acknowledged their debt to him and his music. He was posthumously welcomed as a pioneer into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, and was inducted into the Arkansas Entertainers Hall of Fame in 1998 and the Arkansas Black Hall of Fame in 2005. Although the coming of rock n' roll undermined the careers of veteran musicians like him, he remained a draw at nightclubs in the U.S. and abroad through the 1950s, even though he never returned to the charts he had once dominated. He died in 1975 in Los Angeles, California, and is buried near St. Louis, Missouri.