:For the Greenwich Village-based singer-songwriter and guitarist see Frank Christian Frank Joseph Christian (September 3, 1887 - November 27, 1973) was an early jazz trumpeter. Frank Joseph Christian was born in the Bywater neighborhood of downtown New Orleans, Louisiana. In an interview for Tulane's Jazz Archives, he described his family ancestry as "cayudle", a Creole French term for a mutt or mongrel. His brothers Charles (1886 - 1964) and Emile Christian also worked as professional musicians. Frank showed musical versatility at a young age, and was playing trumpet, clarinet, violin, and tuba professionally by his teens. He started working with bandleader Papa Jack Laine about 1908 and became a mainstay in Laine's bands. He also worked in the bands of Tom Brown, Johnny Fischer, and led his own band. In 1916 Frank Christian was the first choice of Alcide Nunez, Eddie Edwards, and Johnny Stein