Friday Night Cocktal Party
The party is really starting to hum now...we just need some music. Who else to fill this role but the greatest musician of our age: Louis Armstrong. The man who pretty much single handedly turned jazz from a rough regional collective folk music of specialized interest into a popular art form and an art form that could be used by a musical soloist (not just a musical collective) for personal expression. He was a trumpeter without peer, establising the idea of the solo jazz musician and his vocal stylings pretty much became the template for all jazz singing that followed. Armstrong grew up poor in New Orleans and his early years was submerged in that city's rich musical mix. "King" Oliver (Chicago) and Fletcher Henderson (New York) were his early mentors, but Armstrong took their influence and guidance and advanced the music to another level. His deep rich talent combined with this musical knowledge of these three major cities' style of jazz combined for a potent mixture that laid the ground work for all jazz and much of pop music that followed. What I love about Armstrong is his complex and somewhat contradictory nature, how he was able to use this contradiction and still get white audiences to love and accept him and that despite his meager beginnings (or was it because of...) he always was a generous and happy person. Armstrong recieved his Satchmo nickname shortened from Satchelmouth, an expression that came from a description of his very large embouchure. The "Satchmo" nickname and Armstrong's warm Southern personality, combined with his natural love of entertaining and ability to evoke a response from the audience, resulted in a public persona — the grin, the sweat, the handkerchief — that came to seem affected and even something of a racist caricature late in his career. He was also criticized for accepting the title of "King of The Zulus" (in the New Orleans African American community, an extremely honored role as head of leading black Carnival Krewe, but bewildering or offensive to outsiders with their traditional costume of grass-skirts and blackface makeup satirizing southern white attitudes) for Mardi Gras 1949. No one from New Orleans would have turned down that honor. No One...it is a big, big honor. Any Southerner knows, you'd be crazy-stupid to turn it down. The seeming racial insensitivity of Armstrong's King of the Zulus performance has sometimes been seen as part of a larger failing on Armstrong's part. Where some saw a gregarious and outgoing personality, others saw someone trying too hard to appeal to white audiences and essentially becoming a minstrel caricature. Some musicians criticized Armstrong for playing in front of segregated audiences, and for not taking a strong enough stand in the civil rights movement suggesting that he was an Uncle Tom. Billie Holiday countered, however, "Of course Pops toms, but he toms from the heart." This is all attributed to most people's misunderstanding even to this day, of the basic components of any Southern personality: charm, politeness, hospitality and basic avoidance of arguement. All of this does not imply agreement in any way on a Southerners part, they just don't like to appear rude. Armstrong, in fact, was a major financial supporter of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights activists, but mostly preferred to work quietly behind the scenes, not mixing his politics with his work as an entertainer. The few exceptions made it more effective when he did speak out; Armstrong's criticism of President Eisenhower, calling him "two-faced" and "gutless" because of his inaction during the conflict over school desegregation in Little Rock, Arknasas in 1957 made national news. As a protest, Armstrong canceled a planned tour of the Societ Union on behalf of the State Department saying "The way they're treating my people in the South, the government can go to hell" and that he could not represent his government abroad when it was in conflict with its own people. Another aspect of Armstrong's personality that should have hindered his popularity was his huge and very public appetite for marijuana. Even one of his knicknames which he also used for a song title, Muggles, is a reference to his love of the herb. Marijuana was also part of his obsession with heath: good foods and natural bodily functions.He was a huge proponent of a daily laxative regiment and even presented the Royal Family UK with a gift of his favorite herbal laxative, Swiss Kriss. Armstrong so loved Swiss Kriss that one of his Christmas cards featured a picture of him sitting on a toilet — as viewed through a keyhole — with the saying "Satch says, 'Leave it all behind ya!'" Even though he was overly concerned with his health, Satch ballanced this with an extreme love of good food, as is evident from many of his song's titles:Struttin' With Some Barbeque, Cornet Chop Suey, Big Butter And Egg Man, and Cheescake. He also, was often known to sign off on his written correspondence,"Red Beans and Ricely yours". Armstrong also kept a collection hotel retaurant menus upon which he added his own annotations and critiques of any food he ate there. I could go on forever about this man cause I lurve me some Pop Muggles... The influence of Armstrong on the development of jazz is virtually immeasurable. Yet, his irrepressible personality both as a performer, and as a public figure later in his career, was so strong that to some it sometimes overshadowed his contributions as a musician and singer. As a virtuoso trumpet player, Armstrong had a unique tone and an extraordinary talent for melodic improvisation. Through his playing, the trumpet emerged as a solo instrument in jazz and is used widely today. He was a masterful accompanist and ensemble player in addition to his extraordinary skills as a soloist. With his innovations, he raised the bar musically for all who came after him. Armstrong is considered by some to have essentially invented jazz singing. He had an extremely distinctive gravelly voice, which he deployed with great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also greatly skilled at scat singing, or wordless vocalizing. Billie Holiday and Frank Sinatra are just two singers who were greatly indebted to him. Holiday said that she always wanted Bessie Smith's 'big' sound and Armstrong's feeling in her singing. As another legacy, Armstrong set up a non-profit foundation for educating disadvantaged children in music, and bequeathed his house and substantial archives of writings, books, recordings, and memorabilia to the City University of New York's Queens College, to take effect after his and his wife Lucille's death. The Louis Armstrong archives have been available to music researchers, and his home at 34-56 107th Street (between 34th and 35th Avenues), was opened to the public as a museum on October 15, 2003. Finally let us let the man speak for himself in what I feel are two of his most beautiful trumpet and vocal offerings: Come on Pops, let me get you a drink and summin' to eat. How 'bout some of that smoked barbeque brisket?
