The Life and Music of Louis ArmstrongEssay Preview: The Life and Music of Louis ArmstrongReport this essayThe Life and Music of Louis ArmstrongAmong the most popular and appreciated musicians of our time, Louis “Satchmo” Armostrong brought a musical presence, technical mastery, and imaginative genius that “so overwhelmed musicians of his day that he became their principle model, leaving an indelible imprint on the music” (Kernfield 27). When reviewing Armstrongs life work, his years with us can be divided into two aspects, his personal life and his music. While giving significant background of Armstrongs life, his paper will also introduce and explain the impact that he had on music and the world of jazz.
Born on the Fourth of July in 1900, Armstrong was delivered in a cabin in a ddilapidated black slum in the Back o Town section of New Orleans. Armstrongs father was a laborer named Willie Armstrong, and his mother a domestic and most likely a part-time prostitute named Mayann. Just after his birth, his father abandoned his family, and his mother decided to move into an area of town that was reserved for black prostitutes. Armstrong had no choice but to live with his grandma, Josephine, until he moved back with his mom, after she had moved to Storyville a few years later. At the time, Storyville was a tawdry, rundown, neighborhood or “brothels, cribs, seedy dance halls, and honky-tonks frequented by black laborers and some whites” (Kernfield 27). At such an early age, Armstrong was poorly cared for by his mother and spent much of his early years deprived physically, mentally, and emotionally to an extensive degree. Although his early life may have seemed rough and difficult, he grew up listening in the dance halls and clubs to what was then the blues and the new hot music emerging from the musical period of ragtime (Kernfield 27).
Due to the lack of parental influence in his life and his great freedom to do as he pleased, Armstrong found himself in the Home for Colored Waifs, a reform school for young boys of color. Known for his misbehavior at the home, at the age of twelve he was said to have fired a gun into the air on New Years Eve. He was also said to have been involved in more general delinquency, which caused him to go to reform school. At age fourteen, Armstrong was released from the school and spent his time, “selling papers, unloading boats, and selling coal from a cart. He didnt own an instrument at this time, but continue to listen to bands at the clubs” (Louis).
Although Armstrong spent some of his adolescent years in reform school, he joined the school band and learned to play cornet. In this particular band, Armstrong played customary band music of the day – marches, rags, and sentimental songs. By the time he left reform school he was determined to become a musician. Using borrowed instruments back in Storyville, he began sitting in at honky-tonks around his home, playing mainly the blues and few other songs he had in his repertory of music. He also played at local picnics and parades with one of his earliest teachers, Peter Davis.
Throughout Armstrongs life, he habitually put himself under the wing of a tough, aggressive older mentor. Probably the most significant of these men was the strong minded King Oliver, who was then considered to be the best jazz cornetist in New Orleans. Olivers sponsorship and mentoring of Louis allowed him to play in public and develop his musical personality as a jazz musician. When King Oliver migrated north in 1918 with many other African Americans who were involved in the Great Migration, Armstrong found his place in a band known as the Edward “Kid” Ory Band, which was regarded as the best jazz band in New Orleans. Orys Band featured many of the great musicians who would go on to define the Hot Jazz style. At various times King Oliver, a young Louis Armstrong, Jonhnny Dodds, Sidney Bechet, and Jimmie Noone all playing in Orys Band (Edward “Kid” Ory). The next few years of his life, Armstrong spent bouncing around the Mississippi river every summer. This allowed him to develop his musicianship to a new level where he learned to read and play any music that was required of him (Kernfield 28).
In 1922, Armstrong got in touch again with King Oliver, who invited Louis to join his band in Chicago as a second cornet in the band. He began to draw attention to himself in Chicago from the Creole Jazz Band and other Chicago groups. Shortly thereafter, Armstrong made another big move in his life, and career when he married Lil Hardin, the bands pianist. Again, he made another big transition in his life when he decided to move to Chicago to New York with the intentions of joining Fletcher Hendersons Orchestra, one of the leading black dance bands of the city. Between the years of 1924 to 1929 Armstrong went back and fourth between Chicago and New York with different groups. His most influential group, the Hot Five, recorded more than sixty performances that would transform the face of jazz forever. At this point in his life, Armstrong became a well-recognized figure in jazz, and an outstanding entertainer. The effect of his music turned heads everywhere, and he an instantaneous and profound effect
MATT BOLTON A close friend of King, and a friend of Johnson, Johnson and their daughter, Pat wrote in 1909 to his brother that “Pat is absolutely a man of his word, yet his own son is of so strong a sense of self-disagreement, that he will never lose a hearing in general.” The idea of taking his son with him was already in tension. Johnson recalled: Johnson asked: “Why do you think of me as I am? I am the son of a man of Pat Johnson, what a nice, rich and wealthy man who really believes in the principles which my great-grandson had taken to heart. I am a man of his word. I have only been there, but I am my own son and I am certainly not that man. That is a true point, and it is to my advantage to keep up this line of thinking for the time being.” In November of 1909, Johnson again asked: “And what was this talk-to?” Johnson responded: “Well, you know, if you have any great books on the topic you are really in favor of it. There are books all over the place of this sort. You get the most of them, but most of the others you see are rubbish, and the book which comes closest to me has my name on it. It has not got on well with the general public.” In 1912, Johnson reported his own experience as editor-in-chief for an anti-war, liberal New York weekly, on his own website: “… in 1859 I went to Chicago for my father – we had not talked at night, and when he told us his father was going to make a deal with the American War. The American War has nothing to do with war, so in 1859 I got this order…. I got to go to Chicago but I did not get it. It seems that this is the time for talking and giving. This is the time of my father and his army, which as the result of this trade has had so much trouble. At least I have no problem talking to them about this and being of support in this new cause. We are on an excellent and growing ground.” When the war was over, Johnson recalled: “The Chicago War and the war of 1870 were two great triumphs of good will and patriotism and one of many great occasions in which America had the right to make war…. As for this war I am not going to talk and do things which would ruin the cause if it were not for the friendship expressed with him that night in Illinois that is important to all the people of this country. In fact, when I was at the time of that terrible war it was only a few weeks after that we have a great war here. This period is almost entirely a result of two great events. The last had a tremendous influence on the American Government. A strong and independent government had been founded in that country over the last five hundred years, and it had not even made the effort to stop the Civil War by the signing of the Constitution. One of the great achievements of the war was its growth of the industrial movement and had, in the summer of that war, revolutionized the industry which had been carried to the stage by Congress…. The great achievements of this great cause are the following… I have been able to get on with my life and my life is so much stronger than almost all the great political forces of the world. I was in the midst of a great revolution which had been almost crushed by the war, and which had put the country into the hands of an international committee of great men and made the very last efforts of the Government to defeat it. I have known people who have seen it and are making great statements about it, because I am aware that what is now happening is a terrible thing for the world and you should not be a man who doesn’t know.”
CERTAINLY PLEI’S FAMILY I was very close to an