Louis Armstrong

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The Life and Music of Louis Armstrong

Among the most popular and appreciated musicians of our time, Louis "Satchmo" Armostrong brought a musical presence, technical mastery, and imaginative genius that "so overwhelmed musicians of his day that he became their principle model, leaving an indelible imprint on the music" (Kernfield 27). When reviewing Armstrong's life work, his years with us can be divided into two aspects, his personal life and his music. While giving significant background of Armstrong's life, his paper will also introduce and explain the impact that he had on music and the world of jazz.

Born on the Fourth of July in 1900, Armstrong was delivered in a cabin in a ddilapidated black slum in the Back o' Town section of New Orleans. Armstrong's father was a laborer named Willie Armstrong, and his mother a domestic and most likely a part-time prostitute named Mayann. Just after his birth, his father abandoned his family, and his mother decided to move into an area of town that was reserved for black prostitutes. Armstrong had no choice but to live with his grandma, Josephine, until he moved back with his mom, after she had moved to Storyville a few years later. At the time, Storyville was a tawdry, rundown, neighborhood or "brothels, cribs, seedy dance halls, and honky-tonks frequented by black laborers and some whites" (Kernfield 27). At such an early age, Armstrong was poorly cared for by his mother and spent much of his early years deprived physically, mentally, and emotionally to an extensive degree. Although his early life may have seemed rough and difficult, he grew up listening in the dance halls and clubs to what was then the blues and the new hot music emerging from the musical period of ragtime (Kernfi...

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...ng the first international jazz icon in the world. As a man who worked hard at being better all the time, Louis Armstrong practices daily for almost fifty years of his life, and he ended up owning a style of his own. He possessed a special ability on the trumpet and cornet, and his vocal abilities were no downfall. Armstrong's accomplishments as a musician and a person unveiled to the world a unique and talented gentleman, who spent his life bettering himself at his passion as well as developing a genre of music into a more complex and advanced style of music.

Bibliography

Edward "Kid" Ory 16 April 2006 http://www.redhotjazz.com/hot5.html

Hot Five. 16 April 2006 http://www.redhotjazz.com/hot5.html

Kernfield, Barry Ed. The New Groove Dictionary of Jazz. MacMillian Press Limited, London. Volume 1: 1988

Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong (1900-1971). 16 April 2006

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