Influenced by Johnny Dodds, Sidney Bechet, George Lewis (the New Orleans clarinetist, not the avant-garde trombonist), and Jimmie Noone (among others), Norrie Cox is a veteran Dixieland clarinetist who is identified with the Midwestern jazz scene but was born and raised in England. Cox's playing shows no awareness of bop-oriented clarinetists like Buddy DeFranco and Tony Scott; Cox is Dixieland all the way, and his work is quite faithful to the spirit of the New Orleans jazz of the '10s and '20s. Cox's roots aren't bop icons like Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Dexter Gordon, and Thelonious Monk; his roots are Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven bands, Jelly Roll Morton, King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band, Kid Ory, Bunk Johnson, and the seminal Buddy Bolden -- and he has a reputation for being a real historian when it comes to New Orleans jazz. For his website, Cox wrote an informative, impressively comprehensive essay on the history of Dixieland -- one that describes how 19th century events (including the Civil War and the abolitionist movement) led up to the birth of jazz in the 1890s.