John Spikes

{{Short description|American jazz musician}}

{{Infobox musical artist

| name = John Spikes

| image = John Spikes.png

| caption =

| image_size =

| background = non_vocal_instrumentalist

| birth_name = John Curry Spikes

| alias =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1881|07|22}}

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1955|06|28|1881|07|22}}

| origin = Dallas, Texas, United States

| instrument =

| genre = Jazz

| occupation = Musician, songwriter, producer, publisher

| years_active =

| label =

| associated_acts = Reb Spikes
Jelly Roll Morton

| website =

| current_members =

| past_members =

}}

John Curry Spikes (July 22, 1881 – June 28, 1955) was an American jazz musician and entrepreneur.

Along with his brother Reb Spikes, John ran a traveling show band in early 1900s. At one point, Jelly Roll Morton was a member of the band.The Rough Guide to Jazz. Ian Carr, Digby Fairweather, Brian Priestley and Charles Alexander. Rough Guides, 2004. pp. 752-753. {{ISBN|1-84353-256-5}} The Spikes brothers were performing in San Francisco around 1915, under the name The Original So-Different Orchestra, with Reb Spikes billed as the "World's Greatest Saxophonist".Floyd Levin: "The Spikes brothers - a Los Angeles saga", Jazz Journal, December 1951 Around 1919, they settled in Los Angeles, where they started a music store, a nightclub, an agency and a publishing house.

They were the first to record an all-black jazz band in 1922. In 1927, they shot a short sound film that predated The Jazz Singer, the first full-length sound film. Their most enduring musical collaborations were writing the lyrics to Morton's Wolverine Blues and their own composition, Someday Sweetheart, which has become a jazz standard.[http://www.jazzstandards.com/compositions-3/somedaysweetheart.htm Someday Sweetheart] at jazzstandards.com - retrieved on 7 May 2009