Louis Daniel Armstrong was an American trumpeter, composer, singer and occasional actor who was one of the most influential figures in jazz.
Background
Louis Armstrong was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States on July 4, 1900 into a poor African American family. He had a difficult childhood. In 1902, when Louis was just an infant, his father, William Armstrong deserted the family and married another woman. His mother, Mary “Mayann” Albert left the home shortly after that, leaving Louis and his sister Beatrice Armstrong Collins under the care of his grandmother Josephine Armstrong and uncle, Isaac. However, at the age of five, Armstrong and his sister returned to live with their mother.
Education
Louis attended the Fisk School for Boys, where he most likely had early exposure to music. He was obligated to leave school in 1912 to begin working.
On New Year's Eve in 1912, Armstrong fired his stepfather's gun in the air during a New Year's Eve celebration and was arrested on the spot. He was then sent to the Colored Waif's Home for Boys. There, he received musical instruction on the cornet and fell in love with music.
Career
Young Armstrong sang on the streets with friends. It was at this time that Armstrong got his first dance hall job at Henry Ponce. He also played in brass band parades and riverboats in the city. He also worked with Fate Marable, which travelled in a steamboat up and down the Mississippi river. In 1919, when Joe Oliver resigned from his position in Kid Ory’s band, Armstrong replaced him. A year later, he was hired to work on riverboats that traveled the Mississippi. This experience enabled him to play with many prominent jazz musicians and to further develop his skills, learning to read music and undertaking the responsibilities of a professional gig.
In 1922, Oliver invited Armstrong to Chicago to play second cornet in his Creole Jazz Band. As a member of Oliver's band, Armstrong began his lifetime of touring and recording. In 1924, he moved on to New York City to play with the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra at the Roseland Ballroom. Armstrong continued his touring and recording activities with Henderson's group and also made recordings with Sidney Bechet, Ma Rainey, and Bessie Smith. He returned to Chicago in 1925 and made his first recordings as a band leader with his Hot Five (and later his Hot Seven). From 1925 to 1928 he continued a rigorous schedule of performing and recording, which included Heebie Jeebies, the tune that introduced scat singing to a wide audience and West End Blues, one of the most famous recordings in early jazz. During this period, his playing steadily improved, and his traveling and recording activities introduced his music to more and more people.
Armstrong returned to New York City and made his first Broadway appearance in 1929. His 1929 recording of Ain't Misbehavin' introduced the use of a pop song as material for jazz interpretation, helping set the stage for the popular acceptance of jazz that would follow. During the next year, he performed in several U.S. states, including California, where he made his first film and radio appearances. In 1931, he first recorded When It's Sleepytime Down South, the tune that became his theme song. In 1932, he toured England for three months, and during the next few years, continued his extensive domestic and international tours, including a lengthy stay in Paris.
When Armstrong returned to the United States. in 1935, Joe Glaser became his manager. Not only did Glaser free Armstrong from the managerial battles and legal difficulties of the past few years, he remained his manager for the duration of his career and helped transform Armstrong into an international star. Under Glaser's management, Armstrong performed in films, on the radio, and in the best theaters, dance halls, and nightclubs. He worked with big bands, playing music of an increasingly commercial nature as well as small groups that showcased his singing of popular songs.
Throughout the 1950s and 60s, he continued to appear in popular films and made numerous international tours, earning him the title "Ambassador Satch." During a trip to West Africa, Armstrong was greeted by more than one hundred thousand people. In the early 1960's, he continued to record, including two albums with Duke Ellington and the hit Hello Dolly, which reached number one on the Billboard charts. Armstrong performed regularly until recurring health problems gradually curtailed his trumpet playing and singing. Even in the last year of his life, he traveled to London twice, appeared on more than a dozen television shows, and performed at the Newport Jazz Festival to celebrate his 70th birthday.
Armstrong died of a heart attack in his sleep on July 6, 1971.
Louis Armstrong is regarded as the father of jazz music. His innovative techniques, sophistication and inventiveness changed the course of American entertainment as he inspired the musicians to improvise using their own unique styles. His influence in the development of jazz was immense as he guided people such as Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald and Dizzy Gillespie. Armstrong was one of the first truly popular African-American entertainers to "cross over", whose skin color was secondary to his music in an America that was extremely racially divided at the time. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame listed Armstrong's West End Blues on the list of 500 songs that shaped Rock and Roll.
Louis Armstrong was, in fact, baptized as a Catholic at the Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in New Orleans, and he met popes Pius XII and Paul VI, though there is no evidence that he considered himself Catholic. Armstrong seems to have been tolerant towards various religions, but also found humor in them.
Politics
Louis generally remained politically neutral, which at times alienated him from members of the black community who looked to him to use his prominence with white America to become more of an outspoken figure during the Civil Rights Movement of U. S. history. However, he did criticize President Eisenhower for not acting forcefully enough on civil rights.
Personality
Louis's artistry and personality allowed him socially acceptable access to the upper echelons of American society which were highly restricted for black men of his era.
Connections
On March 19, 1918, at the age of 16, Louis married Daisy Parker, a prostitute from Gretna, Louisiana. They adopted a 3-year-old boy, Clarence Armstrong, whose mother, Louis' cousin Flora, died soon after giving birth. Clarence Armstrong was mentally disabled (the result of a head injury at an early age) and Louis would spend the rest of his life taking care of him. Louis' marriage to Parker failed quickly and they separated in 1923.
On February 4, 1924, Louis married Lil Hardin Armstrong, who was Oliver's pianist and had also divorced her first spouse only a few years earlier. His second wife was instrumental in developing his career, but in the late 1920s Hardin and Louis grew apart. They separated in 1931 and divorced in 1938, after which Louis married longtime girlfriend Alpha Smith. His marriage to his third wife lasted four years, and they divorced in 1942. Louis then married Lucille Wilson in October 1942, a singer at the Cotton Club, to whom he was married until his death in 1971.
Armstrong's marriages never produced any offspring, though he loved children. However, in December 2012, 57-year-old Sharon Preston-Folta claimed to be his daughter from a 1950s affair between Armstrong and Lucille "Sweets" Preston, a dancer at the Cotton Club. In a 1955 letter to his manager, Joe Glaser, Armstrong affirmed his belief that Preston's newborn baby was his daughter, and ordered Glaser to pay a monthly allowance of $400 to mother and child.
Armstrong was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1972 by the Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. This Special Merit Award is presented by vote of the Recording Academy's National Trustees to performers who, during their lifetimes, have made creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording.
Armstrong was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1972 by the Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. This Special Merit Award is presented by vote of the Recording Academy's National Trustees to performers who, during their lifetimes, have made creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording.
Grammy Hall of Fame
Recordings of Armstrong were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, which is a special Grammy award established in 1973 to honor recordings that are at least 25 years old, and that have "qualitative or historical significance."
Recordings of Armstrong were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, which is a special Grammy award established in 1973 to honor recordings that are at least 25 years old, and that have "qualitative or historical significance."
