[Dixielandjazz] FW: Louis Armstrong

[Stan Brager]

Hi;

 

You may be interested in the attached review of an analysis of Louis
Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven trumpet solos.

 

Stan

Stan Brager

 

 



Exploring Louis Armstrong's Hot, Sweet Musical Stylings
by Ben Fulton

Salt Lake Tribune, May 22, 2011
Brian Harker spent 15 years on and off studying and researching his new
book, "Louis
Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings," published last month by
Oxford University
Press.
Dipping into this book, it's easy to conclude that Harker, a professor of
music at
Brigham Young University, could have spent another 15 years on the project,
so deep
is his interest in the jazz legend's musical legacy.
Harker's book explores the music, more than the life, of the jazz trumpeter,
and
it serves as an amiable companion to Terry Teachout's biography of last
year, "Pops:
A Life of Louis Armstrong." Some of Harker's volume might be best digested
by specialists,
as evidenced by many references to Armstrong's distinctive way with trumpet
valves.
"Everyone can grasp the joyous sound in his playing from an almost any
period in
his long career," said Harker from his Utah County home. "He's loaded with
charisma.
You can hear it in his playing, his singing and his banter with audiences.
That never
changed.... His attitude was that he wanted to please as many people as
possible
with his music."
Q: What led you to study the music of Louis Armstrong?
A: Scholars generally try to think of the most interesting questions, and
those questions
usually revolve around origins. Louis Armstrong is the granddaddy of them
all. So
here was this extremely important figure, and there were dissertations that
treated
him tangentially, but not one single dissertation on him solely or
centrally. It
was a project crying out to be done, I think.
Q: Did that surprise you?
A: No. At the same time I started my graduate work, jazz graduate studies
was just
cranking up. My adviser, Mark Tucker [professor of jazz studies at Columbia
University],
did the first dissertation on Duke Ellington, and I was just about to start
my dissertation
on Louis Armstrong. Today, though, I would be very surprised, because we've
had 20
years of steady production in jazz scholarship since.
Q: What about the origins of his musical style most surprised you?
A: He modeled his early virtuoso playing on the clarinet style. His style
was more
acrobatic, with a florid arpeggiating style. Then in the 1920s he started
collaborating
with a husband-and-wife dance team. He'd play note-for-note with their dance
steps.
Traditionally, the trumpet player's role was to play a variation on the
melody. He
transferred the active style of clarinet style to his own playing. What I
explore
in great detail was the way he assimilated the multiple styles of the day,
both "hot"
and "sweet" style. "Hot" was more rhythmically intense. "Sweet" was more
buttoned-down
and reserved, and more associated with white players. Armstrong was trying
to bring
these elements together, fusing these styles.
Q: You say that Armstrong's talent was "transformative," rather than
creating new
music out of whole cloth. What about his transformative talent set it apart
from
other transformative talents?
A: He established basic dimensions of a new approach in jazz improvisation
and a
set of expressive devices. Rhythmically, he provided the prototype for the
entire
swing era, and the way jazz rhythm should function. He's the Beethoven of
jazz. He's
the seminal figure everyone came out of. Armstrong was central to the
development
of flexible and wide-ranging improvisation styles that did not exist before
his time.
All the great players -- Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Art Tatum, Roy
Eldridge,
Terry James -- and virtually anybody who distinguished themselves as a
soloist during
the 1930s and beyond owed a debt to him.
Q: When jazz music fans are likely to reach first for a Miles Davis or John
Coltrane
album, what do you suggest to people who have never listened to Louis
Armstrong?
A: I play "What a Wonderful World" to my music classes, a song in which he's
not
even playing the trumpet. When you ask to see who doesn't know that song,
not a single
hand goes up. He's interesting because he has this egghead appeal, but later
on appealed
to a much bigger audience. I'd recommend anyone start with what I believe
are probably
his five best recorded songs: "Big Butter and Egg Man" from 1926,
"Potatohead Blues"
from 1927, "West End Blues" from 1928, "Weather Bird" from 1928 and,
finally, "I
Got a Right to Sing the Blues" from 1933.

 


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