Ada “Bricktop” Smith made a cameo appearance in a Woody Allen movie, helped American jazz leap across the Atlantic to find a second home in 1920s Paris and was a legendary doyenne of French café society.

But little has been written about Smith, an African American woman who defied the social, cultural and economic conventions of her day. Until now. Chapman University student Tracey Swan MFA/MA ’11 has received a Fulbright Scholarship to further her research of Smith in the coming academic year at the University of Paris and the Quai Branly Museum, under the supervision of Professor Ludovic Tournès, author of New Orleans on the Seine: The History of Jazz in France.

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