[Dixielandjazz] Quotes on Armstrong

[Norman Vickers]

To:  DJML and Musicians and Jazzfans list

From: Norman Vickers, Jazz Society of Pensacola

 

Background:  on the Musicians List, I sent another review of Terry
Teachout's book  on Louis Armstrong, "Pops." 

This brought about discussion of the time when some more modern players and
writers criticized Armstrong for

"selling out" to commercial interests, clowning on stage, not doing anything
new and being an "Uncle Tom" instead of being an activist for civil rights.

 

Most of us feel that those accusations were unwarranted and just plain
wrong.  I searched for some quotes from and about Louis Armstrong.  Many of
these  will be familiar to  some on each list.  I hope that you'll find
something of value here.  Maybe a new quotation or a new insight.

 

Good wishes-Keep jazzin'!

 

 

 

 

 

You can't play nothing on modern trumpet that doesn't come from him, not
even modern shit. I cant even remember a time when he sounded bad playing
the trumpet. Never. Not even one time. He had great feeling up in his
playing and he always played on the beat. I just loved the way he played and
sang. (On Louis Armstrong)
    --Miles Davis <http://www.pithypedia.com/?author=Miles+Davis> 

 

 

 

"I never tried to prove nothing, just wanted to give a good show. My life
has always been my music, it's always come first, but the music ain't worth
nothing if you can't lay it on the public. The main thing is to live for
that audience, 'cause what you're there for is to please the people." 

Louis Armstrong 

  _____  


"If it hadn't been for Jazz, there wouldn't be no rock and roll." 

Louis Armstrong 

  _____  


"What we play is life, my whole life, my whole soul, my whole spirit is to
blow that horn," he told a doctor a few months before he died in 1971. No,
he wouldn't cancel an upcoming date at the Waldorf-Astoria. "The people are
waiting for me, I got to do it, Doc, I got to do it." 

Louis Armstrong 

  _____  


"Be good if I get to the Pearly Gates .... I'll play with Gabriel." 

Louis Armstrong 

  _____  


"Not too slow, not too fast. Kind of half-fast!" 

Louis Armstrong 

  _____  


"In my opinion, Louis Armstrong is the greatest trumpet stylist of all time
and has influenced every trumpet player of his time and long after" 

Jazz trumpeter Al Hirt 

  _____  


"All we can do is be glad we live in the same century as Louis Armstrong" 

Jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis 

  _____  


"If it weren't for him, there wouldn't be any of us." 

Jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie 

  _____  


"You can't play anything on a horn that Louis hasn't played." 

Jazz trumpeter Miles Davis 

  _____  


"He left an undying testimony to the human condition in the America of his
time" 

Jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis 

  _____  


"There never was any hidden side to him. He came `as is' " 

All Stars clarinetist Barney Bigard 

  _____  


"In the small hours, a friend and I were wandering around the French
quarter, when suddenly I heard a trumpet in the distance. I couldn't see
anything but an excursion boat gliding through the mist back to port. Then
the tune became more distinct. The boat was still far off. But in the bow I
could see a Negro standing in the wind, holding a trumpet high and sending
out the most brilliant notes I had ever heard. It was jazz. It was what I
had been hoping to hear all through the night. I don't even know whether it
was 'Tiger Rag' or 'Panama'
<http://members.fortunecity.com/kybhr_enterprizes/quotes.html> . But it was
Louis Armstrong descending from the sky like a god. the ship hugged the bank
as if it were driven there by the powerful trumpet beats. I stayed
absolutely still, just listening, until the boat dropped anchor. 

All Stars trombone man Jack Teagarden 
remembering his 1921 New Orleans visit. 

  _____  


"Louis Armstrong was the epitome of jazz and always will be" 

Jazz pianist, composer, and bandleader Duke Ellington 

  _____  


"Louis Armstrong is the master of the jazz solo. He became the beacon, the
light in the tower, that helped the rest of us navigate the tricky waters of
jazz improvisation." 

New Orleans Jazz pianist Ellis Marsalis 

 

From:  http://members.fortunecity.com/kybhr_enterprizes/quotes.html

 

Also, Dizzy Gillespie is reported to have said about Armstrong,

" no him, then no me." ( See modification of that quote above-If it weren't
for him, there wouldn't be any of us.)  I've been looking for the source of
this quote but have been unable to find it.  Can some scholar help me?

 

Norman Vickers, Jazz Society of Pensacola

                                                     --End--