[Dixielandjazz] Louis' "breaktrhough" and later playing

[Charles Suhor]

> Steve Barbone wrote:
> ...I'm certainly not the guy to question the statement
> that Louis's creative years were gone by the
> 1960s. But I wanted to note that Wynton Marsalis,
> one of the folks who comments on Satchmo
> throughout the film, states near the end that
> late "Pops" was as creative as any music Marsalis
> had ever heard, including any and all classical,
> or whatever genre ... He cites the "nuance" of
> Armstrong's playing, using that exact word, and
> says that the caliber of a player's solos in late
> stages is determined not by how many notes he or
> she can play nor how fast, but by how much can be
> expressed in nuance ...


Yes, Steve--and Dizzy Gillespie said, at a time when figs vs. boppers 
wars were still on (paraphrased here from memory), that Louis is the 
greatest and is always worth hearing because every note he plays is 
place exactly right for timing and expressiveness, and that Louis' 
conception is the essence of jazz and the model for all. It's true that 
Louis' quantum breakthrough was fully realized and demonstrated first 
in the Hot 5 and 7 recordings. The other players were great innovators, 
but Louis' time and invention are the what-jazz-is-all-about clinic. 
Can you imagine what it would be like to be a jazz fan or musician in 
the early 1900s, hearing some fresh and exciting stuff all the 
time--then getting blown away by the Hot 5s and 7s? I knew folks in 
N.O. who went through those changes, and never got over it. Louis 
didn't sustain his improvisational genius, but his core conception of 
fire and expressiveness was intact throughout his career, and Dizzy's 
appreciation of that (and ours) is warranted.

Charlie Suhor