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One for Pops, the Epitome of Jazz

A mythic power and faith in the dream of America mark one very talented, ennobling soul and light unto world, Louis D. Armstrong.

"If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what I call an American standard, an American original."

— Duke Ellington, jazz composer and bandleader

As a proud patriotic American, he always claimed that he was born on the Fourth of July. He was mistaken in that, and missed the year by also frequently stating that he was born with the last century, in 1900. In truth, he likely did not know for certain, and like other wandering dirt poor boys born in the south at the time, assumed an easily recalled "close enough" date for formal purposes early on in life. By the time his almost 70 odd but very storied years were done on this earth he had become not only a world famous entertainer, but he was widely recognized worldwide as the quintessential American produced in that era.

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He was all that and more — bandleader, star trumpet and coronet soloist, and virtuoso, composer, comedian, improvisational innovator and inventor of musical styles and forms, singer, movie star, world music fan and recording junkie, official U.S. State Department goodwill ambassador and friend to musicians everywhere.

Decades after his death in 1971, his distinctive gravely voice alone was and still is widely recognized and copied. His unmistakable style, buoyant stage presence and performance genius for five long decades and longer, however, died with him, and the world mourned a universal cultural icon beloved and listened to on every continent. 

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But for the unalloyed joy that he brought to the world, the name of Louis Armstrong has not faded from history. He almost single handedly made American jazz a worldwide phenomenon and the popular cultural endeavor and global artistic expression it became.

His inspirational story of growing up in abject poverty from a dirt-floored shack in early 1900s New Orleans to becoming a much beloved musical phenomenon is utterly remarkable and easily belongs alongside the legends of the greats and giants of American history. His world renowned broad, irrepressible smile reflected his joyous but serious approach to life, and his love and dedicated attention to both his music and his fellow man was returned in full measure. 

To this day, nearly everyone still loves "Louie" Armstrong, and just the mention of his name makes people smile from the memory of his legacy and joyous, contagiously humorous life force. Yet many of the younger generation remain ignorant of this multi-talented musical genius who was for a time one of the most recognized entertainers on the planet. He's also widely misunderstood as the wild winds of popular culture have forgotten the greatness of a legacy that truly belongs to the ages. 

"The bottom line of any country in the world is 'what did we contribute to the world?' We contributed Louis Armstrong," singer and jazz great Tony Bennett said.

Many apocryphal stories abound about such a widely known musical visionary. But it was not until 1988 in Gary Giddins' excellent biography Satchmo that the world finally learned of Armstrong's true birthdate, Aug. 4, 1901, with the rediscovery of Satch's baptismal registration, in Latin, from a New Orleans's Catholic church. Gidden's sums up his early life as "raised in a house of cards in the middle of a gale," noting here's "a man who saw life from the gutter up and learned to accept it all."

"He was born poor, died rich, and never hurt anyone along the way," said Duke Ellington, jazz composer, bandleader and contemporary. 

Armstrong's uniquely American story begins in desperate poverty at the turn of the last century in New Orleans. Born poor and black in a deeply segregated New Orleans, he is virtually orphaned at a young age and learns to get dinner from the scraps left over from restaurants.

Growing up in the firmament of musical discovery and invention that made early 1900s New Orleans justly famous, he readily developed a talent for enjoying and performing music on the streets of the town in a small quartet of acapella singers. It was there as a small boy that he learned to hide the pennies given in tips inside his capacious mouth, earning him the nickname "Satchmo" or "Satchel mouth" as one story tells it. 

He was noted as an industrious lad and likely with sheer survival always utmost in mind, he held many jobs as a child. Perhaps one of the more memorable ones was with a family of Lithuanian Jews, the Karnofsky's, who owned a tailor shop, and also had a rag and junk hauling business, and for whom little Louis did many odd jobs.

It was the father of that family who bought Louie his first coronet, for which he was eternally grateful. Years later he would recall this generous family who had fed, clothed and nurtured him as a boy, noting they had taught him "to live with real life and determination."

Ever thankful he wore a Star of David pendant by way of a reminder of his blessing in their acquaintance and friendship. At his death, Armstrong made certain to also repay the repeated kindness and mentoring from many of New Orleans' early jazz greats by leaving the bulk of his substantial estate to musical education for the young. Indeed, the legend of this early friendship lives on in the name of a musical charity in New Orleans to this day, the Karnofsky Project.  

Armstrong later improved his playing skills and learned to read music in the New Orleans Home for Colored Waifs, where he was a frequent guest for various charges of petty delinquency during much of his youth. By the time of his "parole" at age 14, he had been made the home's band leader and was playing in various city brass marching bands, becoming well known to older masters of the new form of jazz being then invented on the spot in their hometown.

Among these early Jazz greats were Bunk Johnson, Kid Ory and especially Armstrong's mentor and later employer "King" Joe Oliver. Oliver would later provide Armstrong with his second professional long-lasting stint as a working musician, then in Chicago in the early 1920s in King Oliver's Creole Jazz Orchestra.

Throughout his life these many happy interventions, meetings and happenstances helped to make Armstrong a famous performer before even the advent of radio. That was no small feat and was done in the decade before mass and widespread broadcasting in the mid to late 1920s.

It was not until 1930 that roughly 50 percent of U.S. households had a radio, and by that time Louie was already on his third professional musical "career" in New York City. Learning  all the time and benefiting from every musical collaboration he enjoyed with the many myriad musicians befriended worldwide, these were the true secrets of Satchmo's great success. 

From his inventive and talented musician, composer and second wife, Lil Hardin Armstrong, to his ever revolving cast of famous jazzmen in his various "All Stars" groups, they created the world that surrounded Louie and helped to reinvent jazz and the American songbook more than once.

His famed All Star trombonist Jack Teagarden recalled memorably hearing Louie and about Louie on his early fabled trips up the Mississippi in Fate Marable's famed riverboat "hot dance" bands of 1917 to 1920. That was Armstrong's first real known professional job.

But it was also in his vast curiosity, incredible industry and lifelong earnest, dutiful and loving productive relationships with literally hundreds of working jazz men and women that made success possible for so long. Together they made great art and lovely, joyous, tuneful music that every American can enjoy and be proud to call our own.

The great musical innovator, composer and "Father of the Blues" W.C Handy cried with joy and hugged Louie upon hearing his treatment of the compositions Handy once made famous on the now legendary 1954 recording Louis Armstrong plays W.C. Handy. He did the same for early jazzman Fats Waller in 1955 with Satch plays Fats, another classic gem with his All Stars, and several memorable albums with jazz great Ella Fitzgerald as well.  

Enduring grueling non-stop touring schedules well into the 1960s, Armstrong remained a frenetically busy, complex but lovable character to the end of his days. He even beat out the Beatles in 1964 for the No. 1 Billboard slot with the Broadway pop tune Hello Dolly, making the then 63-year-old performer the oldest on record to do so.

At his funeral in Queens, NY, dozens of children from the Corona neighborhood where he lived were seen outside the church, mourning for their friend. In the end as fellow jazz trumpeter Miles Davis put it, "You can't play anything on a horn that Louis hasn't played."

It's this mythic power and faith in the dream of America that we celebrate when we recall the joy brought to millions by this one very talented, ennobling soul and light unto world, Louis D. Armstrong. Thanks Pops.

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