"A New York Treasure" --Village Voice
Tag: louis armstrong
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Beat of the Day

hatshats

Free and easy.

Picture by Bags

BGS: King Louis


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My latest reprint for The Daily Beast gives Nat Hentoff on Louis Armstrong:

Louis Armstrong, summoned by King Oliver, came up to Chicago in the summer of 1922, Buster Bailey reports that “Louis upset Chicago. All the musicians came to hear Louis. What made Louis upset Chicago so? His execution, for one thing, and his ideas, his drive. Well, they didn’t call it drive, they called it ‘attack’ at the time. Yes, that’s what it was, man. They got crazy for his feeling.”

His feeling. Even toward the end of his life, when many of the same tunes would be played night after night, month after month, Louis could still, as trombonist Trummy Young remembers, make a sideman cry.

His feeling. Billie Holiday, a young girl in Baltimore, listening to Louis’s recordings: “He didn’t say any words, but somehow it just moved me so. It sounded so sad and sweet, all at the same time. It sounded like he was making love to me. That’s how I wanted to sing.”

There has been no jazz musician so widely, deeply, durably influential as Louis. And no trumpet player who could do all he could do on the horn. Once, Louis told journalist Gilbert Millstein, “I’m playin’ a date in Florida, livin’ in the colored section and I’m playin’ my horn for myself one afternoon. A knock come on the door and there’s an old, gray-haired flute player from the Philadelphia Orchestra, down there for his health. Walking through that neighborhood, he heard this horn, playing Cavalleria Rusticana, which he said he never heard phrased like that before. To him it was as if an orchestra was behind it. 

Collage by Louis Armstrong. 

Beat of the Day

larm

You can say I’m sort of the boss so get lost.

Beat of the Day

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The Man.

Beat of the Day

Boo.

and this too:

Saturdazed Soul

“Hotter Than That”–Louis Armstrong

[Photo Via: The Minimalisto]

Best I Can Do is Stay Happy

Louis:

Bad Ass

This is just the fuggin’ greatest.

Beat of the Day

“I Can’t Give You Anything But Love”–Louis

[Photo Via: Yann Fauchier]

Beat of the Day

“Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea”–Louis

[Photo Credit: David Tribby]

Sundazed Soul

“I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” Louis Armstrong

[Photo Via: Pug King]

Beat of the Day

Happy Birfday.

Beat of the Day

Happiness is…this:

[Collage by Louis Armstrong]

Sunday Soul

 

Indeed.

Beat of the Day

Happiness is this record:

Yeah…Uh-huh…Sure.

Beat of the Day Louis

Yes, please.

Music and Art

While we wait on more Cliff Lee news

New York Movie, By Edward Hopper (1939)

And from Pops…

Beat of the Day

Wonderful version of a classic tune…

Beat of the Day

One of my favorites from Uncle Louis:

Beat of the Day

Since July 4th was Louis Armstrong’s birthday (and even if it wasn’t his official birthday, play along), let’s dedicate the rest of the week’s beats to him. Here’s one of Woody’s favorites:

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