Jazz & Blues Lounge

I love writing these posts about certain artists that have greatly influenced and set the groundwork for modern jazz.  It usually sparks a debate, or gets me a few comments from jazz fans, and I love that.  That’s part of why I do what I do.

I wrote about Dizzy yesterday and got a decent response from it.  There is another artist that really helped jazz become what it is today, but there are a lot of people who probably don’t really realize the talent and artistic value the man brought to the world of jazz.  Why?  Well, because his songs are often used in movies, and are still popular today.  For some reason, that seems to detract from the influence he had on the music.

This talent is Louis Armstrong.  Yes, the man known as “Satchmo.”  The same man with the gravelly voice who sang “Hello, Dolly!” and “What a Wonderful World.”  What people probably don’t remember, though, is that he laid the groundwork for modern jazz.  He was one of the first to move jazz music from the laid-out chords into more improvisational jazz.  He was also an outstaning cornet and trumpet player.

I was never a huge Louis fan, I have to say.  Once again, this goes back to my days working in jazz radio.  I used to like to play the longest songs I could find and Louis’ recordings tended to be very short.  Also, the transfer of most of his records into a digital format like a CD sounded kind of bad.  Of course, Louis’ most-famous recordings were done in the 20s and 30s. 

What most people remember is Louis’ singing and “scat singing.”  In fact, he did so much recording that used his voice, his talent as a trumpeter is often lost.  However, if you look at a picture of Louis you notice that his lip, just beneath his nose, looks a little odd.  That was actuall damage he did to his lip from his strong method of playing the trumpet.  At some point, his lip and his fingers prevented him from playing the trumpet as much, so he turned to his vocalizations.

Louis has always been popular and his songs turn up again and again.  In 1964 he actually knocked the Beatles out of the number 1 spot with his recording of “Hello, Dolly!”

He recorded some definitive recordings of some classic songs and he played with some greats of jazz like Earl “Fatha” Hines, Coleman Hawkins and Jack Teagarden.  None other than Miles Davis himself credits his interest in the trumpet and the influence of Louis Armstrong on his own playing and has stated that it all started with Louis for all of the trumpeters who came after him.

I would love to give you a list of Louis albums.  Again, though, they are hard to find.  He has been collected again and again and again in a number of greatest hits albums.  You can probably download a number of his tunes right now if you want to look. 

When you listen to Louis, you may not be able to draw a direct line to Dizzy orMiles, but it’s there.  It was there in their minds back then, and much of the groundwork was laid with Louis.  Just as Led Zeppelin probably wouldn’t have existed without “Rock Around the Clock” so Miles may not have happened without Louis Armstrong.

2 Comments