[Dixielandjazz] Armstrong and Jimmie Rodgers

[Steve Barbone]

rahberry at comcast.net (Rae Ann) asked

> Hi Listers,
> I heard today of two songs by Louis Armstrong, Fatha Hines, and Jimmie
> Rodgers.  I don't remember the titles.  I never knew these people recorded
> together.
> Does anyone know anything about this and where can one hear these tunes?
> TIA,

Louis was a "country" fan. One of the few jazz musicians to record with both
Jimmie Rodgers and Johnny Cash. Following is a little background which
suggests the Lil Hardin Armstrong was the pianist, not Hines. And be sure to
read the last two paragraphs about the Johnny Cash gig. Does anyone know
where that video might lurk?

Cheers,
Steve Barbone

The session with America¹s Blue Yodeler, Jimmie Rodgers, has fascinated
romantic scholars who have insisted on seeing it as a symbolic watershed
meeting between two genres, and as one of the first integrated sessions in
the annals of country. At the time, neither Armstrong nor Rodgers thought
much about it. They met in Holly-wood on July 16, 1930, at the end of a long
session to stockpile Rodgers¹s records. Rodgers had worked up a version of
³Standing on the Corner,² which he was going to call ³Blue Yodel No. 9,² and
his producer, Ralph Peer, was casting about for a trumpet player to back him
up. Armstrong and his wife at the time, the pianist Lil Hardin Armstrong,
just happened to be in town on vacation, but Armstrong was always up for a
little freelancing.

Armstrong had been creating a cottage industry for himself through back-up
gigs with a wide variety of blues singers‹Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, Alberta
Hunter, Bertha ³Chippie² Hill, and others. To him, Rodgers was just another
singer who needed back-up. The original Victor session sheets don¹t even
mention Armstrong by name (instead, one reads, ³acc. by trumpet and piano²).
Nor was his name included on the original releases for the song. For years,
the only way to know for sure that Armstrong had been on the session was a
handwritten note from Rodgers that mentions him as the trumpet player. One
reason for this might well have been that Armstrong was still under
exclusive contract to the rival Okeh company (he would soon sign with Victor
Records). The fact that Armstrong could remember the session some sixty
years later suggests that he, if not his record company, was impressed with
the event. 

In the 1950s, as Armstrong began to expand his role as an entertainer and
singer, he, like almost every other pop singer in New York, tried his hand
at some of the new Hank Williams songs that Fred Rose and Mitch Miller were
pushing. Armstrong didn¹t have the chart success with ³Cold, Cold Heart²
that Tony Bennett had, or that Joni James had with ³Your Cheatin¹ Heart²;
but his singles were solid journeyman renditions, and each contained a
well-wrought Armstrong trumpet solo. During the next decade, Armstrong the
singer, following up on ³Hello, Dolly² (1964) and ³Mame² (1966), found
himself venturing into even stranger territory. He recorded ³The Ballad of
Davy Crockett² for a Disney album, a single with Guy Lombardo, a duet with
Barbra Streisand, a tour de force version of ³Saints² with Danny Kaye, a
disastrous pairing of ³Mack the Knife² with the great Berlin cabaret singer
Lotte Lenya, and later a version of John Lennon¹s ³Give Peace a Chance.²
Fortunately, there were moments of glory, too: a series of albums produced
by Bob Thiele that featured a modern classic reading of ³What a Wonderful
World.² 

So it wasn¹t really that much of a stretch when, in the spring of 1970,
Armstrong was approached by two producers‹New Yorker Ivan Mogull and
Nashvillian Jack Clement‹to consider an all-country album. Since the late
¹40s, Nashville had been an unheralded center for rhythm & blues, and in
more recent years major black stars like Ray Charles (1962), the Supremes
(1965), and soul singer O.B. McClinton (1971) had made popular country
albums. Furthermore, Jack Clement, who spearheaded the project, was Cowboy
Jack Clement, who spent his early days playing and producing rockabilly at
Sun Studio in Memphis, and who was now a major Nashville producer pushing
his hot new discovery, the first modern black country star, Charley Pride.
The reporter who asked Armstrong if his coming presaged an interest in
blacks to start performing country hadn¹t done his homework.

The album was put together in August. Clement selected the songs and chose
the best session players from various studios. Guitarist Billy Grammer led
the group, with Larry Butler on piano, Willie Ackerman on drums, and Stu
Basore on steel: a tight, typical Nashville sound. The basic tracks were cut
at Clement¹s studio and then sent to New York for Satchmo¹s vocals and a
little horn section sweetening. Clement later recalled that they had no
trouble adjusting the songs or arrangements to Armstrong¹s style. The
result, he said, was ³very identifiably Louis Armstrong.²

Rather than saddle Armstrong with a familiar round of Hank Williams, Webb
Pierce, and Jim Reeves chestnuts, Clement sought out more current songs‹ones
that would appeal to Armstrong¹s sense of humor and emotion, and not insult
his musical intelligence. The most popular songs were Nat King Cole¹s 1962
hit ³Ramblin¹ Rose,² David Houston¹s career song from 1966, ³Almost
Persuaded,² and Claude King¹s saga song, ³Wolverton Mountain² (1962).

Clement added one of his Charley Pride chart-toppers, ³The Easy Part¹s Over²
(1968), and Sonny James¹s tragicomic Native-American song, ³Running Bear²
(1969). Satchmo seems to have the most fun, and gives his best performance,
on Clement¹s own ³Miller¹s Cave,² a bloodthirsty account of adultery and
murder that sends the singer off with a series of evil chuckles as he fades
out. Armstrong applies his best ballad style to ³Crystal Chandeliers² (from
Carl Belew) and a lesser known country blues number called ³Black Cloud,²
penned by Bill Brock.

Louis ³Country and Western² Armstrong was released on the Avco-Embassy
label, out of New York. It sold modestly, and was ignored by all of the
Nashville papers. And though nobody knew it at the time, it would be Louis
Armstrong¹s swan song: the last album of a recording career that spanned six
decades and redefined American music.

The Monday after the airport press conference, Armstrong shuffled up the
ramp to the Grand Ole Opry stage at Ryman Auditorium, over to where they
were filming The Johnny Cash Show. He walked un-steadily to his seat on the
set and took a few tentative phrases on his trumpet. Then someone came out
and presented him with a white, ten-gallon hat the size of a wedding cake,
and he broke into his famous smile. Things loosened up. Backed by show
regulars Mother Maybelle and the Carter Family, he did a medley of songs
from the new album: ³Running Bear,² ³Ramblin¹ Rose,² and ³Almost Persuaded.²
Then Cash himself, cracking a rare grin, moved in and sat and talked with
him about Jimmie Rodgers, one of Cash¹s heroes. Yes, Satchmo remembered
backing him on ³Blue Yodel No. 9,² and yes, it would be fun to try to
recreate it. So with Cash playing Rodgers and Armstrong playing‹well,
himself‹the pair brought the audience back to 1930. Cash and Armstrong
swapped choruses on the old blues standard‹Cash doing a swaggering vocal,
Armstrong playing a dynamic, elegant series of trumpet breaks, in spite of
the fact that his doctors in New York had told him to stop playing for good.

When it was all wrapped-up, Armstrong returned to New York. Within nine
months, he would be gone, dying at home in his sleep on July 6, 1971. But
one of his great testaments had been left behind in Nashville, committed to
film on Cash¹s show, seemingly forgotten by Armstrong¹s fans, but creating
an indelible memory for Johnny Cash, Ray Edenton, Jack Clement, and those
who were lucky enough to have been in the Ryman that night. In a technical
sense, it would become a lost chapter in country-music history. But in a
broader sense, it remains one of those shining, egalitarian experiments in
American roots music‹which they actually pulled off, like the two great pros
they were.