Ricky Riccardi, Director of Research Collections for the Louis Armstrong House Museum in New York, began his trilogy of biographies with the intention of reappraising Armstrong’s later work. Hence his first volume was What A Wonderful World: The Magic Of Louis Armstrong’s Later Years. The second volume, Heart Full Of Rhythm: The Big Band Years Of Louis Armstrong, covers 1929-46. Finally, Riccardi has turned to Armstrong’s early career, up to 1929. This volume happens to be the first of the three I’ve read, and so I can read them in chronological order.
I did briefly wonder whether another biography of Armstrong is needed, but it didn’t take long to realise that the answer is a resounding “Yes!” The life story is so incredible that it bears re-telling – and this is a great account with sane interpretation of key events and issues, and much new information. Most biographies of Armstrong say less about his early days; in Stomp Off, Let’s Go, Armstrong doesn’t leave for Chicago until half-way through. Riccardi discusses the influence of Bunk Johnson, and Oliver’s slow development as a cornetist; the importance of Buddy Petit, Kid Ory and Fate Marable is also covered. The book has new anecdotes and details, drawn from Armstrong’s private tapes, recently discovered manuscripts and letters, and little-known interviews – also from reminiscences by boyhood friends, fellow musicians and his sister Beatrice “Mama Lucy” Armstrong, as well as from the unfinished memoirs of Lil Hardin Armstrong.
The biography reminded me of many things I’d forgotten, such as Armstrong’s debt to opera. Ricardi says Kid Rena “might have inspired Armstrong to play high notes on his cornet, but the recordings of Caruso, Galli-Curci, Luisa Tetrazzini, and the other opera stars of the day would instill prolonged notes of splendid strength and quality” and “dramatic intensity and fervor” in his playing.
Armstrong’s impact on New York musicians as a member of Fletcher Henderson’s orchestra during 1924-25 is well known. Less known was the resentment of those who looked down on the “country boy”, and the horn-player’s feelings about Henderson’s and Oliver’s neglect of his singing: “Though Henderson was later effusive in his praise of Armstrong – ‘Perhaps our greatest musician,’ he said of him in 1950 – Armstrong couldn’t help but feel that the educated, light-skinned Henderson looked down on his dark-skinned, southern-fried disposition.”
I was vaguely aware that figures of the Harlem Renaissance were not fans of jazz, but Riccardi spells this out in intriguing detail: “Henderson performed for the NAACP’s annual benefit at Happy Rhone’s nightclub, attended by W. E. B. DuBois, among other figures of what would later be known as the ‘Harlem Renaissance’. Jazz in its purest form was never fully embraced by artists of the Harlem Renaissance – except by poet Langston Hughes – but Henderson was admired for his more acceptable brand of arranged dance music. Armstrong would become a lifelong member of the NAACP, but he was not a fan of DuBois’s ‘Talented Tenth’ rhetoric.”
When Armstrong purchased J. A. Rogers’ two-volume anthology World’s Great Men Of Color in 1947, he listed the chapters he read, including entries on Frederick Douglass, Bert Williams and Booker T. Washington. But he annotated a chapter he did not want to read, writing “No Du Boise,” and underlining “No” twice.
I didn’t realise that the rather notorious Sweethearts On Parade was composed by Guy Lombardo’s brother Carmen. The Canadian bandleader eventually recorded it in November 1928. Bandleader Dickerson became enchanted with the song and purchased a “a big arrangement” with an ending that became a fad of the day: the drummer’s ascending run on vibraphone, ending on the tonic.
Riccardi’s critical judgments on Armstrong’s classic ensemble are persuasive. For instance, he comments that “Though the Hot Five would later garner a reputation for helping transition jazz from an ensemble-based music to a soloist’s art form, they also represent perhaps the pinnacle of the polyphonic style due to the familiarity between the principals.”
Stomp Off, Let’s Go ends with Armstrong’s triumphant return to New York in 1929. It’s a self-standing volume, and the epilogue relates what happened to key characters in later years. It sums up Armstrong’s relationship with New Orleans – his impatience with its racism, and love for its place in his early life. It’s a classic biography and an excellent introduction to the work of one of the 20th century’s greatest musicians.
Stomp Off, Let’s Go – The Early Years of Louis Armstrong, by Ricky Riccardi. Oxford University Press; 466pp, £26.99/£14.62 (hbk, e-book). ISBN 9780197614488
