- Hardcover: 496 pages
- Publisher: Harcourt Publishers,U.S. (4 April 2010)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0151010897
- ISBN-13: 978-0151010899
- Product Dimensions: 23.1 x 16.1 x 3.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 500,045 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
| ||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
"POPS is the book we have been waiting for: essential reading for anyone curious about music, American culture, and one man's ability to inspire the world." Michael Cogswell, director Louis Armstrong House Museum" --Michael Cogswell
Product Description
Louis Armstrong was the greatest jazz musician of the twentieth century and a giant of modern American culture. He knocked the Beatles off the top of the charts, wrote the finest of all jazz autobiographies--without a collaborator--and created collages that have been compared to the art of Romare Bearden. The ranks of his admirers included Johnny Cash, Jackson Pollock and Orson Welles. Offstage he was witty, introspective and unexpectedly complex, a beloved colleague with an explosive temper whose larger-than-life personality was tougher and more sharp-edged than his worshipping fans ever knew. Wall Street Journal arts columnist Terry Teachout has drawn on a cache of important new sources unavailable to previous Armstrong biographers, including hundreds of private recordings of backstage and after-hours conversations that Armstrong made throughout the second half of his life, to craft a sweeping new narrative biography of this towering figure that shares full, accurate versions of such storied events as Armstrong's decision to break up his big band and his quarrel with President Eisenhower for the first time. Certain to be the definitive word on Armstrong for our generation, POPS paints a gripping portrait of the man, his world and his music that will stand alongside Gary Giddins' Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams and Peter Guralnick's Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley as a classic biography of a major American musician.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong, Wall Street journalist and author, Terry Teachout traces Mr. Armstrong's youthful journey through the winding streets of New Orleans at the turn of 20th century: from the jook joints and bordellos to a Christian boys home for wayward youth and a solitary, but beneficent Jewish home to the highest pinnacles of musical and artistic success. This was a biography that was done right.
*Why another biography?
**Two (2) historically unanswered questions about Louis Armstrong
***A brief review of Armstrong's Life
****Louis Armstrong vs. Miles Davis and Nat King Cole
*****Concluding Thoughts
*Before I read a biography, I typically find myself struggling internally like two wrestlers wanting the dominant position because biographies and, especially, autobiographies are rarely truthful or forthcoming. I generally ask myself, "Do I really want to know this person?" Or, "Will this person's life-experiences really provide me with constructive and, hopefully, universal information for my own use?"
The dilemma becomes a lot more complicated, if the person is well known and many things have already been written about her/him. What's new here that hasn't been written before considering Mr. Armstrong, himself, wrote three autobiographical volumes?
**With regards to Mr. Armstrong, there are two (2) questions that have never been answered to my satisfaction (but then, who am I to make such demands anyway?) but I'll still ask.
1. What is it about "Louie Armstrong," The Performer, which made him so beloved that even a Wall Street Journal writer would consider chronicling another chapter of his life, four decades since his passing?
2. What is it about Louis Armstrong, the Man, whose image made him a reviled figure by many of his younger contemporaries such as Miles Davis and several "liberal" media outlets?
In order for this to be worth my time and money, Mr. Teachout would have to answer all of these questions in addition to filling in a lot of missing details of Armstrong's life along the way.
The first thing that should be noted is that Mr. Teachout uses the indefinite article, "A" in the title instead of "The" to define Mr. Armstrong's life, as if to suggest that there were more than one life that Mr. Armstrong lived. Reading through this page-turner, however, one does wonder, whom did all of these other Armstrong biographers write about? And, by the end of this book, it becomes abundantly clear that "the" Louis Armstrong of people's memory is not the man we're introduced to here.
***New Orleans, at the turn of the twentieth century, was the urban hotspot south of the Mason-Dixon where Southerners sojourned from their Antebellum "hospitality," where a pool of inexpensive labor swelled the regions population fourfold in a decade and where European tourists converged into the landscape of a new kind of American existence called "Creole." It was also the place where Roman Catholics and Protestants waged an aggressive and unrelenting immoral political campaign against each other and one of the few places where prostitution was legalized. New Orleans was called the "eccentric cousin" in the South. If this was the New Orleans Kate Chopin painted so eloquently in The Awakening, then Louis Armstrong's childhood is nothing less than a page out of Tom Sawyer.
It was during this time of Louis Armstrong's youth that Armstrong's parents separated and left him with a relative. After a brief reconciliation and a sister followed, Armstrong's father abandoned the family for good leaving Armstrong's mother, Mayann, to turn to prostitution.
Armstrong had a run in with the law and spent some time at the Colored Waif's Home For Boys. This was where Armstrong was first heard playing the horn, marking his initiation into the world of Dixieland/Creole Jazz. He would play various functions and engagements before Joe "King" Oliver moved to Chicago, eventually inviting him to join "The Hot Five" in the Windy City. The adult life of Louis Armstrong was about to begin.
While in Chicago, Armstrong would meet his second wife, Lillian "Lil" who was also in Oliver's band. During this middle period, after Lil took over the reigns of Armstrong's career, he was now fronting and developing his own distinct style of showmanship, which mixed vaudevillian humor with "Big Band" and Swing jazz. Wildly popular, such casual and informal interaction with the band and the audience was something completely new and certainly not to be expected from a "colored" performer. This, I suspect, is where the perception of Armstrong being an accommodationist began.
Armstrong would slowly gain fame throughout Europe as offers to take his act to film awaited him at home. There were many firsts for Armstrong: he shared top billing with Bing Crosby in "Pennies From Heaven." He made, according to Teachout, the first "concept" album "Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy" seven months before Sinatra made his landmark album, In The Wee Small Hours (1955). Along the way, Armstrong married and divorced twice.
His later years were spent making albums for Decca, Columbia and Verve. The last of which he was reunited with his most famous duet partner, Ella Fitzgerald.
****Louis Armstrong was one of the early pioneers of jazz. But, there's a line of demarcation within this genre. On one side, you have the Swing/big band/ vocals by people like Armstrong, Benny Goodman, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Perry Como, Ella Fitzgerald, Anita O'Day and Nat King Cole.
On the other side, you had the lesser-known, underground "lounge lizard" jazz. This style of jazz, unlike its counterpart was marked by its somber and sometimes morbid tonality. This existential presentation was set against the Showmanship-style of Armstrong. And, within this group you had Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Art Blakely, Thelonius Monk, Charlie Parker, Ornette Coleman and many more.
(There were some in the middle ground who were respected by both groups of jazz enthusiasts: Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton, Dizzy Gillespie, Dinah Washington and, maybe, Billie Holiday. I should throw Ray Charles in this group, but he seems to be an enigma.)
This is an important distinction because of the implications of calling Armstrong a sellout. The way Bob Marley was to Reggae, so was Armstrong to Jazz: he was the first national and international ambassador of his genre. The implications of this is hard to imagine considering we're talking close to 90 years since his fame spread from the riverboat bandstands of New Orleans to gangland threats he suffered in Chicago to the home he shared with Lucille in Queens, New York. 90 years ago. A period after the Reconstruction, but still in the heat of segregation and rapid discrimination still ruled the day.
If you're a pioneer in your field, as Armstrong no doubt was, and with an audience that was spellbound by your music and charisma, what responsibilities do you have if one (1), you have no formal education. Two (2), you're living in a midst of the deep South where by conservative estimates state that there was one lynching everyday in the decade of 1910. Three (3), you have a family before you're 20. And, four (4), you're "colored."
Now, it didn't help that he'd eventually co-starred in films that had less than flattering images of African-Americans. It also must be said in Armstrong's defense, that he was the first to insist on integration. Teachout tells of quite a few instances where Armstrong lashes out at racial discrimination in his shows. His bands were always integrated. He played with those who genuinely loved to play his style of music.
I would suggest that what Armstrong did in the early to middle decades of the twentieth century is precisely what Muhammad Ali did in the 1960's, which was he presented himself as a goodwill ambassador. He had his limitations (as all of us do) and all things being equal, disparaging remarks by Miles Davis and, unfortunately, Dizzy Gillespie should be considered the harbingers for a small, isolated group of younger musicians who didn't have the life experiences that would enable them to embrace such a broad cross section of humanity. It was a lethal concoction of ignorance and jealousy that slandered this great man: plain and simple.
To deny something obvious is one thing, to refuse to allow that which is obvious to determine the course of one's behavior is quite another. He never denied racism and he never accepted it as to determine whom he'd play with and whom he'd play for. The same can't be said of Nat King Cole, unfortunately.
*****Rarely has a biography so gripped my imagination for the past two weeks as Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong has. Terry Teachout should be commended for his erudition albeit laudatory biography of the greatest jazz musician of the twentieth century.
*Why another biography?
**Two (2) historically unanswered questions about Louis Armstrong
***A brief review of Armstrong's Life
****Louis Armstrong vs. Miles Davis and Nat King Cole
*****Concluding Thoughts
*Before I read a biography, I typically find myself struggling internally like two wrestlers wanting the dominant position because biographies and, especially, autobiographies are rarely truthful or forthcoming. I generally ask myself, "Do I really want to know this person?" Or, "Will this person's life-experiences really provide me with constructive and, hopefully, universal information for my own use?"
The dilemma becomes a lot more complicated, if the person is well known and many things have already been written about her/him. What's new here that hasn't been written before considering Mr. Armstrong, himself, wrote three autobiographical volumes?
**With regards to Mr. Armstrong, there are two (2) questions that have never been answered to my satisfaction (but then, who am I to make such demands anyway?) but I'll still ask.
1. What is it about "Louie Armstrong," The Performer, which made him so beloved that even a Wall Street Journal writer would consider chronicling another chapter of his life, four decades since his passing?
2. What is it about Louis Armstrong, the Man, whose image made him a reviled figure by many of his younger contemporaries such as Miles Davis and several "liberal" media outlets?
In order for this to be worth my time and money, Mr. Teachout would have to answer all of these questions in addition to filling in a lot of missing details of Armstrong's life along the way.
The first thing that should be noted is that Mr. Teachout uses the indefinite article, "A" in the title instead of "The" to define Mr. Armstrong's life, as if to suggest that there were more than one life that Mr. Armstrong lived. Reading through this page-turner, however, one does wonder, whom did all of these other Armstrong biographers write about? And, by the end of this book, it becomes abundantly clear that "the" Louis Armstrong of people's memory is not the man we're introduced to here.
***New Orleans, at the turn of the twentieth century, was the urban hotspot south of the Mason-Dixon where Southerners sojourned from their Antebellum "hospitality," where a pool of inexpensive labor swelled the regions population fourfold in a decade and where European tourists converged into the landscape of a new kind of American existence called "Creole." It was also the place where Roman Catholics and Protestants waged an aggressive and unrelenting immoral political campaign against each other and one of the few places where prostitution was legalized. New Orleans was called the "eccentric cousin" in the South. If this was the New Orleans Kate Chopin painted so eloquently in The Awakening, then Louis Armstrong's childhood is nothing less than a page out of Tom Sawyer.
It was during this time of Louis Armstrong's youth that Armstrong's parents separated and left him with a relative. After a brief reconciliation and a sister followed, Armstrong's father abandoned the family for good leaving Armstrong's mother, Mayann, to turn to prostitution.
Armstrong had a run in with the law and spent some time at the Colored Waif's Home For Boys. This was where Armstrong was first heard playing the horn, marking his initiation into the world of Dixieland/Creole Jazz. He would play various functions and engagements before Joe "King" Oliver moved to Chicago, eventually inviting him to join "The Hot Five" in the Windy City. The adult life of Louis Armstrong was about to begin.
While in Chicago, Armstrong would meet his second wife, Lillian "Lil" who was also in Oliver's band. During this middle period, after Lil took over the reigns of Armstrong's career, he was now fronting and developing his own distinct style of showmanship, which mixed vaudevillian humor with "Big Band" and Swing jazz. Wildly popular, such casual and informal interaction with the band and the audience was something completely new and certainly not to be expected from a "colored" performer. This, I suspect, is where the perception of Armstrong being an accommodationist began.
Armstrong would slowly gain fame throughout Europe as offers to take his act to film awaited him at home. There were many firsts for Armstrong: he shared top billing with Bing Crosby in "Pennies From Heaven." He made, according to Teachout, the first "concept" album "Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy" seven months before Sinatra made his landmark album, In The Wee Small Hours (1955). Along the way, Armstrong married and divorced twice.
His later years were spent making albums for Decca, Columbia and Verve. The last of which he was reunited with his most famous duet partner, Ella Fitzgerald.
****Louis Armstrong was one of the early pioneers of jazz. But, there's a line of demarcation within this genre. On one side, you have the Swing/big band/ vocals by people like Armstrong, Benny Goodman, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Perry Como, Ella Fitzgerald, Anita O'Day and Nat King Cole.
On the other side, you had the lesser-known, underground "lounge lizard" jazz. This style of jazz, unlike its counterpart was marked by its somber and sometimes morbid tonality. This existential presentation was set against the Showmanship-style of Armstrong. And, within this group you had Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Art Blakely, Thelonius Monk, Charlie Parker, Ornette Coleman and many more.
(There were some in the middle ground who were respected by both groups of jazz enthusiasts: Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton, Dizzy Gillespie, Dinah Washington and, maybe, Billie Holiday. I should throw Ray Charles in this group, but he seems to be an enigma.)
This is an important distinction because of the implications of calling Armstrong a sellout. The way Bob Marley was to Reggae, so was Armstrong to Jazz: he was the first national and international ambassador of his genre. The implications of this is hard to imagine considering we're talking close to 90 years since his fame spread from the riverboat bandstands of New Orleans to gangland threats he suffered in Chicago to the home he shared with Lucille in Queens, New York. 90 years ago. A period after the Reconstruction, but still in the heat of segregation and rapid discrimination still ruled the day.
If you're a pioneer in your field, as Armstrong no doubt was, and with an audience that was spellbound by your music and charisma, what responsibilities do you have if one (1), you have no formal education. Two (2), you're living in a midst of the deep South where by conservative estimates state that there was one lynching everyday in the decade of 1910. Three (3), you have a family before you're 20. And, four (4), you're "colored."
Now, it didn't help that he'd eventually co-starred in films that had less than flattering images of African-Americans. It also must be said in Armstrong's defense, that he was the first to insist on integration. Teachout tells of quite a few instances where Armstrong lashes out at racial discrimination in his shows. His bands were always integrated. He played with those who genuinely loved to play his style of music.
I would suggest that what Armstrong did in the early to middle decades of the twentieth century is precisely what Muhammad Ali did in the 1960's, which was he presented himself as a goodwill ambassador. He had his limitations (as all of us do) and all things being equal, disparaging remarks by Miles Davis and, unfortunately, Dizzy Gillespie should be considered the harbingers for a small, isolated group of younger musicians who didn't have the life experiences that would enable them to embrace such a broad cross section of humanity. It was a lethal concoction of ignorance and jealousy that slandered this great man: plain and simple.
To deny something obvious is one thing, to refuse to allow that which is obvious to determine the course of one's behavior is quite another. He never denied racism and he never accepted it as to determine whom he'd play with and whom he'd play for. The same can't be said of Nat King Cole, unfortunately.
*****Rarely has a biography so gripped my imagination for the past two weeks as Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong has. Terry Teachout should be commended for his erudition albeit laudatory biography of the greatest jazz musician of the twentieth century.
Format:Hardcover
I began reading this book with high expectations, and for the most part they were fulfilled. The author details Armstrong's early life, and the factors which helped shape his character, with a sympathetic touch, without descending into the sort of psychobabble that seems fashionable nowadays. Louis had a symbiotic relationship with Joe Glaser, which afforded him protection and relieved him of responsibility for the day-to-day running of his affairs. The downside of their agreement was that Joe also relieved him of much of his earnings, and kept him hard at work to the point of exhaustion. Whilst much of this was already in the public domain, it's set out here in a very clear and concise fashion, yet Teachout's approach is not judgemental, leaving readers free to draw their own conclusions.
The 12 chapters run to just under 400 pages, augmented by an appendix of 30 key recordings, around 50 pages of source notes, a select biography, and a 25-page index. My only criticism of the book itself is that whilst the paper is adequate for the print, it fails to do justice to the photos, which should have been reproduced separately on gloss quality sheets.
The author seems to have accepted Louis' account of how he came to scat on "Heebie Jeebies", a story which has always struck me as inherently suspect. When the number was published the following July it carried a photo of the Hot Five on the cover (the only piece of sheet music ever to do so) together with a complete transcription of Louis' "skat chorus", but that is not mentioned. In view of the number of times reference is made to Louis' lip splitting, I was surprised that this was attributed solely to his grinding work rate and his propensity for the upper register, omitting any reference to the shape of the mouthpiece he used, although that was another important factor.
Given the evident level of scholarship involved, I was disappointed to come across several factual errors. On page 96 there's a reference to Armstrong being caught out by Okeh as having moonlighted for another company. I believe the recording in question was made for Vocalion, and featured Louis with Perry Bradford's Jazz Phools, but he didn't take the vocal. So it was his playing, not his singing, that gave him away.
His introduction to chapter 7 refers to the Savoy Orpheans accompanying George Gershwin in the London premiere of "Rhapsody in Blue". That premiere took place on October 28, 1925, and the soloist was Billy Mayerl. The Savoy hotel chain employed several bands, and their entertainments manager would ask guitarist Joe Brannelly to scout for musicians when he returned to America on holiday. Carroll Gibbons, Rudy Vallee and others came to England as a result. There was a constant fusion of ideas from America; Ambrose had spent several years there before returning to England, and Americans Roy Fox, Jay Whidden, Jack Harris, and brothers Al & Ray Starita all led dance bands which were more than capable of producing hot dance numbers.
He states that "a number of noted American players, including Buster Bailey, Jimmy Dorsey, and Adrian Rollini, paid brief visits to England around (1927)". This is disingenuous; quite apart from the influences mentioned above Adrian Rollini came to England after the collapse of his ill-fated Club New Yorker band, bringing with him two other ex-members of the California Ramblers, namely trumpeter Chelsea Quealey and alto-saxophonist Bobby Davis, and stayed until the end of 1929. Another visiting fireman was Sylvester Ahola, who likewise came to England in early 1928, and joined Ambrose' Orchestra at the May Fair Hotel, where he played alongside Danny Polo, and was in great demand for recording sessions.
Despite those errors and omissions, and a very biased account of Billy Cotton's recording of "Bessie Couldn't Help It", this book should be essential reading for anyone who has an interest in Louis Armstrong and wants to broaden their understanding of the man and his music.
The 12 chapters run to just under 400 pages, augmented by an appendix of 30 key recordings, around 50 pages of source notes, a select biography, and a 25-page index. My only criticism of the book itself is that whilst the paper is adequate for the print, it fails to do justice to the photos, which should have been reproduced separately on gloss quality sheets.
The author seems to have accepted Louis' account of how he came to scat on "Heebie Jeebies", a story which has always struck me as inherently suspect. When the number was published the following July it carried a photo of the Hot Five on the cover (the only piece of sheet music ever to do so) together with a complete transcription of Louis' "skat chorus", but that is not mentioned. In view of the number of times reference is made to Louis' lip splitting, I was surprised that this was attributed solely to his grinding work rate and his propensity for the upper register, omitting any reference to the shape of the mouthpiece he used, although that was another important factor.
Given the evident level of scholarship involved, I was disappointed to come across several factual errors. On page 96 there's a reference to Armstrong being caught out by Okeh as having moonlighted for another company. I believe the recording in question was made for Vocalion, and featured Louis with Perry Bradford's Jazz Phools, but he didn't take the vocal. So it was his playing, not his singing, that gave him away.
His introduction to chapter 7 refers to the Savoy Orpheans accompanying George Gershwin in the London premiere of "Rhapsody in Blue". That premiere took place on October 28, 1925, and the soloist was Billy Mayerl. The Savoy hotel chain employed several bands, and their entertainments manager would ask guitarist Joe Brannelly to scout for musicians when he returned to America on holiday. Carroll Gibbons, Rudy Vallee and others came to England as a result. There was a constant fusion of ideas from America; Ambrose had spent several years there before returning to England, and Americans Roy Fox, Jay Whidden, Jack Harris, and brothers Al & Ray Starita all led dance bands which were more than capable of producing hot dance numbers.
He states that "a number of noted American players, including Buster Bailey, Jimmy Dorsey, and Adrian Rollini, paid brief visits to England around (1927)". This is disingenuous; quite apart from the influences mentioned above Adrian Rollini came to England after the collapse of his ill-fated Club New Yorker band, bringing with him two other ex-members of the California Ramblers, namely trumpeter Chelsea Quealey and alto-saxophonist Bobby Davis, and stayed until the end of 1929. Another visiting fireman was Sylvester Ahola, who likewise came to England in early 1928, and joined Ambrose' Orchestra at the May Fair Hotel, where he played alongside Danny Polo, and was in great demand for recording sessions.
Despite those errors and omissions, and a very biased account of Billy Cotton's recording of "Bessie Couldn't Help It", this book should be essential reading for anyone who has an interest in Louis Armstrong and wants to broaden their understanding of the man and his music.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
67 reviews
39 of 45 people found the following review helpful
Easily sets the new standard for Armstrong biographies
11 Nov 2009
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Louis Armstrong stands as one of the legends of twentieth century music. During five decades as a performer he thrilled audiences with his cornet and trumpet virtuosity, while his gravelly voice made him one of the most popular and recognizable singers of his day. Such a career became the stuff of legend, making it difficult to discern the truth underneath. In this book, Terry Teachout undertakes the difficult task to sift though the legend to discover the man underneath.
In this he is aided by Armstrong, who left behind two autobiographies and numerous audio recordings. From them we learn a man unashamed of his impoverished beginnings in the "black Storyville" neighborhood of New Orleans. The musical scene of the town's brothels and clubs provided the young Armstrong with both his early musical education and his first employment. Teachout goes on to describe his journey during the 1920s from promising young cornet player into the headlining talent he became by the end of the decade. Teachout rightly gives this period, one that saw some of his most innovative music, considerable attention, but he challenges critics such as Gunther Schuller who dismiss Armstrong's work with the big bands of the 1930s and 1940s. These decades dominate the biography, taking up eight of the book's twelve chapters. The final chapters chronicle the established entertainer who faced the twin challenges of aging and the disdainful attitude of the younger generation of musicians who followed in his giant footsteps.
In examining Armstrong's life, Teachout brings to bear his skills as detective and storyteller. He succeeds in depicting a very human yet enormously gifted performer, a talented musician who was also a superb entertainer. His book easily supersedes earlier biographies of Armstrong in its thoroughness and readability, yet it remains frustratingly incomplete by itself. For while Teachout does an admirable job of describing Armstrong's music, the book really is best enjoyed when accompanied by the songs Teachout describes. Though the author identified thirty songs in an appendix that can be downloaded by the reader, the sheer amount of music he describes warrants more comprehensive collections, such as The Complete Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings and Louis Armstrong: The Complete RCA Victor Recordings. It is only when listening to them in conjunction with Teachout's book that the degree of Armstrong's achievement is best understood.
In this he is aided by Armstrong, who left behind two autobiographies and numerous audio recordings. From them we learn a man unashamed of his impoverished beginnings in the "black Storyville" neighborhood of New Orleans. The musical scene of the town's brothels and clubs provided the young Armstrong with both his early musical education and his first employment. Teachout goes on to describe his journey during the 1920s from promising young cornet player into the headlining talent he became by the end of the decade. Teachout rightly gives this period, one that saw some of his most innovative music, considerable attention, but he challenges critics such as Gunther Schuller who dismiss Armstrong's work with the big bands of the 1930s and 1940s. These decades dominate the biography, taking up eight of the book's twelve chapters. The final chapters chronicle the established entertainer who faced the twin challenges of aging and the disdainful attitude of the younger generation of musicians who followed in his giant footsteps.
In examining Armstrong's life, Teachout brings to bear his skills as detective and storyteller. He succeeds in depicting a very human yet enormously gifted performer, a talented musician who was also a superb entertainer. His book easily supersedes earlier biographies of Armstrong in its thoroughness and readability, yet it remains frustratingly incomplete by itself. For while Teachout does an admirable job of describing Armstrong's music, the book really is best enjoyed when accompanied by the songs Teachout describes. Though the author identified thirty songs in an appendix that can be downloaded by the reader, the sheer amount of music he describes warrants more comprehensive collections, such as The Complete Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings and Louis Armstrong: The Complete RCA Victor Recordings. It is only when listening to them in conjunction with Teachout's book that the degree of Armstrong's achievement is best understood.
22 of 25 people found the following review helpful
A FIRST RATE BIOGRAPHY OF A TRUE AMERICAN HERO
18 Nov 2009
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Pops isn't just a good biography of Louis Armstrong's full and varied life. It's an exceptionally good biography. It shouldn't replace Laurence Bergreen's excellent Louis Armstrong: An Extravagant life (New York Times Notable Book for 1997) in anyone's library. But Teachout's book complements Bergreen's and it stand on its own as a model of sympathetic, scrupulously researched biographical writing. For those who are interested in him, there is little new that they can learn about the well examined life of this American icon.
As soon as popular critics and serious scholars started writing about that uniquely American pop music, jazz, they wrote about Armstrong. They couldn't avoid it because Armstrong, more than any other individual, set the standards and many of the conventions for jazz, in his playing and his singing. (Where would Bing Crosby have been without Louis to imitate?) He wasn't the first great jazz soloist: Sidney Bechet holds that honor by a few years. And Armstrong's seminal group, the Hot Five (later Hot Seven), played outside the recording studio just one time. It was never a working group, never a combo formed to play in the clubs and dance halls where jazz was being forged in the twenties and thirties.
Trying to imagine jazz without Armstrong is like trying to imagine modern art without Picasso or the essay form without Montaigne. His contemporaries knew it and admitted it. Even those who were on the outs with him -Earl Hines, Coleman Hawkins--knew that Louis was The Man. Red Allen, the trumpeter with (to my mind) the most beautiful sound in jazz, wanted nothing more than to sound like Louis. Jack Teagarden tried to play him on the trombone (and succeeded). Even harbingers of modernity like Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis, who were offended by what they saw as Armstrong's Uncle Tom antics on stage, admitted that Armstrong was The One.
A virtue of Teachout's fine book is to place Armstrong's on-stage antics and off-stage persona in context. Armstrong was by temperament, especially while performing, a sunny person, who enjoyed performing and did not draw a line between clowning and serious music making. (That's not quite accurate. Music making was the thing he cared about most in the world -even over home and his much beloved wife Lucille--and he was deadly serious about his music, but he didn't find it incongruous to perform well, to appeal to the audience. In short, as Teachout eloquently explains, Armstrong, like many performers of his generation, saw himself as an entertainer as well as and complementary to a musician. He wanted to do well in both guises, and did.
Teachout also does the reader a favor by his sympathetic and wise assessment of Louis's later performances and recordings, from the 1930s on. This is a body of work that many critics dismiss as the wreckage left over after Louis's artistic vision left him. (Even so savvy a critic as Gunther Schuller dismissed Louis's later work as uninspired.) Teachout does not argue for virtues that aren't there in Louis's often dreary big band recordings from the thirties, but he does point to individual recordings of excellence, and I found his assessment of the small group Louis led from 1947 on, the Louis Armstrong All-Stars, convincing. (Like me, Teachout finds Russ Garcia's arrangements for Louis in the late fifties an embarrassment, and, like me, wishes that Ellington and Armstrong had made more out of their one outing together, when all that happened was that Ellington sat in on piano with Louis's All-Stars.) I have decided! It's time for me to listen to more of the Louis of the thirties and forties. I've been missing out on a potential treat! I bought my first jazz record sixty years ago, when I was thirteen. It's time for me to listen to ALL of Louis, not just cherry pick across the decades.
As soon as popular critics and serious scholars started writing about that uniquely American pop music, jazz, they wrote about Armstrong. They couldn't avoid it because Armstrong, more than any other individual, set the standards and many of the conventions for jazz, in his playing and his singing. (Where would Bing Crosby have been without Louis to imitate?) He wasn't the first great jazz soloist: Sidney Bechet holds that honor by a few years. And Armstrong's seminal group, the Hot Five (later Hot Seven), played outside the recording studio just one time. It was never a working group, never a combo formed to play in the clubs and dance halls where jazz was being forged in the twenties and thirties.
Trying to imagine jazz without Armstrong is like trying to imagine modern art without Picasso or the essay form without Montaigne. His contemporaries knew it and admitted it. Even those who were on the outs with him -Earl Hines, Coleman Hawkins--knew that Louis was The Man. Red Allen, the trumpeter with (to my mind) the most beautiful sound in jazz, wanted nothing more than to sound like Louis. Jack Teagarden tried to play him on the trombone (and succeeded). Even harbingers of modernity like Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis, who were offended by what they saw as Armstrong's Uncle Tom antics on stage, admitted that Armstrong was The One.
A virtue of Teachout's fine book is to place Armstrong's on-stage antics and off-stage persona in context. Armstrong was by temperament, especially while performing, a sunny person, who enjoyed performing and did not draw a line between clowning and serious music making. (That's not quite accurate. Music making was the thing he cared about most in the world -even over home and his much beloved wife Lucille--and he was deadly serious about his music, but he didn't find it incongruous to perform well, to appeal to the audience. In short, as Teachout eloquently explains, Armstrong, like many performers of his generation, saw himself as an entertainer as well as and complementary to a musician. He wanted to do well in both guises, and did.
Teachout also does the reader a favor by his sympathetic and wise assessment of Louis's later performances and recordings, from the 1930s on. This is a body of work that many critics dismiss as the wreckage left over after Louis's artistic vision left him. (Even so savvy a critic as Gunther Schuller dismissed Louis's later work as uninspired.) Teachout does not argue for virtues that aren't there in Louis's often dreary big band recordings from the thirties, but he does point to individual recordings of excellence, and I found his assessment of the small group Louis led from 1947 on, the Louis Armstrong All-Stars, convincing. (Like me, Teachout finds Russ Garcia's arrangements for Louis in the late fifties an embarrassment, and, like me, wishes that Ellington and Armstrong had made more out of their one outing together, when all that happened was that Ellington sat in on piano with Louis's All-Stars.) I have decided! It's time for me to listen to more of the Louis of the thirties and forties. I've been missing out on a potential treat! I bought my first jazz record sixty years ago, when I was thirteen. It's time for me to listen to ALL of Louis, not just cherry pick across the decades.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Teachout has scored a hit with his biography of one of the most iconic and original personalities in musical history
28 Dec 2009
Format:Hardcover
In reading POPS, I figured that I was going to fill in some of the few gaps of my personal knowledge of Louis Armstrong. After all, I told myself, I played trumpet for a third of my life, have been a fan of jazz for nearly four decades, and actually own several albums of Armstrong's solo and collaborative works. So, how much more could I learn about one of my musical heroes?
A lot, it turns out. My personal gaps were both many and multi-dimensional.
My perception of how Louis (never "Louie") Armstrong and his music were affected by his environment --- his family, contemporaries and mentors --- as well as the influence he had on others and their music was woefully incomplete and in some instances downright inaccurate.
In POPS, author Terry Teachout uses numerous sources simultaneously to paint a picture of what was happening at several points in Armstrong's career --- including adding his subject's own voice via his legacy of letters and personal writings to complete the canvas. He goes into great detail describing Armstrong's relationship with his early mentors and how they shaped both his style and his outward personality. Despite talent and fame that had surpassed those of his mentors, Armstrong always remained deferential; even while occasionally playing second fiddle as a guest in his former master's bands, he never showed them up by outplaying or upstaging them. His respect for the craft and those who had introduced him to it was immense.
In describing Armstrong's early recording sessions, Teachout details the technology available at the time and the limitations it imposed on the instrumentation for the recordings. He then portrays how each member of the recording ensemble related to Armstrong both personally and musically. Finally (and probably most impressive to the jazz geek inside me), Teachout painstakingly describes note for note how Armstrong played some of his early and seminal original compositions. Several times, I found myself putting down the biography and looking for a recording to listen to for confirmation, only to find the author had nailed it dead on.
Teachout continues this impressive level of detail and completeness throughout --- which gave me a breadth and depth of understanding of Armstrong that frankly was an extremely pleasant surprise. I was even treated to several nuggets about Armstrong and his influencers and those influenced by him. I did not know, for example, that Armstrong was not only a fan of Bing Crosby but also incorporated the crooner's distinct style into his own. I was also surprised to learn that Flea (the bass player for the LA-based band "The Red Hot Chili Peppers") considers Armstrong to be among his favorite artists of all time.
Teachout has scored a hit with his biography of one of the most iconic and original personalities in musical history. And he spares no source to make certain that his description of Armstrong is complete, accurate and entertaining.
--- Reviewed by Mark Shinn
A lot, it turns out. My personal gaps were both many and multi-dimensional.
My perception of how Louis (never "Louie") Armstrong and his music were affected by his environment --- his family, contemporaries and mentors --- as well as the influence he had on others and their music was woefully incomplete and in some instances downright inaccurate.
In POPS, author Terry Teachout uses numerous sources simultaneously to paint a picture of what was happening at several points in Armstrong's career --- including adding his subject's own voice via his legacy of letters and personal writings to complete the canvas. He goes into great detail describing Armstrong's relationship with his early mentors and how they shaped both his style and his outward personality. Despite talent and fame that had surpassed those of his mentors, Armstrong always remained deferential; even while occasionally playing second fiddle as a guest in his former master's bands, he never showed them up by outplaying or upstaging them. His respect for the craft and those who had introduced him to it was immense.
In describing Armstrong's early recording sessions, Teachout details the technology available at the time and the limitations it imposed on the instrumentation for the recordings. He then portrays how each member of the recording ensemble related to Armstrong both personally and musically. Finally (and probably most impressive to the jazz geek inside me), Teachout painstakingly describes note for note how Armstrong played some of his early and seminal original compositions. Several times, I found myself putting down the biography and looking for a recording to listen to for confirmation, only to find the author had nailed it dead on.
Teachout continues this impressive level of detail and completeness throughout --- which gave me a breadth and depth of understanding of Armstrong that frankly was an extremely pleasant surprise. I was even treated to several nuggets about Armstrong and his influencers and those influenced by him. I did not know, for example, that Armstrong was not only a fan of Bing Crosby but also incorporated the crooner's distinct style into his own. I was also surprised to learn that Flea (the bass player for the LA-based band "The Red Hot Chili Peppers") considers Armstrong to be among his favorite artists of all time.
Teachout has scored a hit with his biography of one of the most iconic and original personalities in musical history. And he spares no source to make certain that his description of Armstrong is complete, accurate and entertaining.
--- Reviewed by Mark Shinn
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
