By John Edward Hasse

No one would have predicted that when Louis Armstrong was born in 1901, to exceedingly humble circumstances in New Orleans’s red-light area, he would someday become one of the most beloved entertainers of the 20th century and the model for all jazz soloists to come. Yet he overcame a lack of formal education (he dropped out of fifth grade), persistent and pernicious racism, the cutthroatedness of the music business, and the challenges of the Great Depression to become a world-famous artist and celebrity who changed American music forever.

New Orleans was rich in European and especially Italian opera, and they exerted a powerful influence on Armstrong. You can hear it in his improvised quotations from various operas and, moreover, in his dramatic bursts of melody, florid embellishments, operatic, bravura musical gestures (such as those sensational high-note endings), and way of theatrically placing himself, as soloist, in the sonic foreground.

He learned not only from opera, but from whatever else he could. Before he was 25, he had apprenticed with various bands in New Orleans and on the Mississippi riverboats, worked with the great cornetist Joe “King” Oliver in Chicago, joined Fletcher Henderson’s high-profile band in New York City, and embarked on a series of historic small-group studio recordings in Chicago with his Hot Five and Hot Seven (1925-58). Such sides as Big Butter and Egg Man, Hotter Than That, Struttin’ with Some Barbecue, Potato Head Blues, and S.O.L. Blues stand as among the greatest recordings in American music. In these recordings, particularly West End Blues, he virtually single-handedly transformed jazz from a ensemble music into a soloist’s art.

What set him apart from the others? His technical mastery on his instrument, his big, beautiful tone, his rich imagination as a soloist, and the force of his musical personality. And he boasted a seminal gift of personalizing the material he recorded, transforming whatever he recorded into music that was unmistakably his in sound and style and ownership. The essence of jazz–making something new out of something old, making something personal out of something shared–has no finer examplar than Armstrong.

In the 1920s, Armstrong emerged as the dominant soloist in jazz and as the individual who would, more than anyone else, take the role of soloist to new heights in American music. He also pioneered what came to be called “swing” music as his rhythmic innovations loosened up the beat of jazz, provided a greater variety of rhythms, and made its momentum more flowing. In the early 1930s, Armstrong influenced other musicians to play slightly ahead of the beat and, in so doing, transformed the rhythmic feel of jazz, and through it, other musical idioms.

By the 1930s, Armstrong had become a cultural hero of epic proportions, above all to musicians. Besides his highly influential instrumental sound, he developed a vocal style-marked by his unique gravelly tone, passionate delivery, and superb vowel coloration–as distinctive as his seminal style on trumpet. On such recordings as Stardust and Lazy River (both 1931), he projected a sense of exultation somewhere between singing and shouting, as Henry Pleasants has noted, and this required singing at both a high volume and pitch. Just as Armstrong lived his life, so he sang with feeling, energy, infectious joie de vivre, and good humor–listen to I'll Be Glad When You’re Dead, You Rascal You (1931) or Laughin’ Louie (1933) and you can’t help smiling. He boasted an extraordinary ability to overcome commonplace material, often transforming lackluster pop songs into enduring art (Sweethearts on Parade, 1930). And he set the standard for scat singing (Basin Street Blues, 1933), his example clarion and timeless. Armstrong left a profound influence on generations of vocalists in jazz--and indeed in other kinds of music.

The seminal jazz soloist and the most influential American musician ever? Yes, but most people loved Armstrong because he was a consummate and one-of-a-kind entertainer blessed with infectious charm, humor, and warmth. He enjoyed a nearly forty-some-year career as bandleader, recording artist, and movie star and appropriately became the first jazz musician to appear on the cover of Time magazine.

He broke through countless color barriers; epitomized the liberated black man as he consorted with royalty and heads of state; and generated good will for the United States through tours, recordings, and broadcast. But Armstrong’s name will live on and on and on because of the genius, joy, and influence of his music.

© Copyright 2000 by John Edward Hasse. All rights reserved. Used by permission.