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Frank Adams—jazzman, teacher, scholar and wise elder—is a Birmingham treasure.  A community fixture known widely as “Doc,” he is, among other things, a walking and talking encyclopedia of Birmingham jazz.  In his earliest days he studied under two great bandleaders, Lincoln Elementary’s William Wise Handy (a nephew to W.C. Handy, the legendary “Father of the Blues”) and Industrial High School’s hugely influential John T. “Fess” Whatley.  In his high school years, he joined Sonny Blount’s band, before Blount left Birmingham and became Sun Ra.  In 1945 Adams enrolled at Howard University, where with a group of friends he founded the Howard Swingmasters.  In the years that followed, he played with some of the towering figures of jazz—most notably Duke Ellington—before returning to Birmingham as a bandleader and educator in his own right.
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