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Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901ref|birthday
– July 6, 1971) (also known by the nicknames
Satchmo and Pops) was an United States|American
jazz musician. Probably the most famous jazz
musician of the 20th century, Armstrong was a
charismatic, innovative performer whose musical
skills and bright personality transformed jazz
from a rough regional dance music into a popular
art form. Armstrong first achieved fame as a
trumpet|trumpeter, but was also one of the most
influential jazz singers, and towards the end of
his career was best known as a vocalist.

==Life==

Armstrong was born to a poor family in New
Orleans, Louisiana. His youth was spent in poverty
in a rough neighborhood of uptown New Orleans. He
first learned to play cornet in the band of the
New Orleans Home for Colored Waifs where he had
been sent after firing a pistol into the air to
celebrate at a New Year's Eve celebration. He
followed the city's frequent brass band parades
and listened to older musicians every chance he
got, learning from Bunk Johnson, Buddy Petit, and
above all Joe "King" Oliver| Joe "King" Oliver,
who acted as a mentor and almost a father figure
to young Armstrong. Armstrong later played in the
brass bands and riverboats of New Orleans, and
first started traveling with the well regarded
band of Fate Marable which toured on a steamboat
up and down the Mississippi River; he described
his time with Marable as "going to the University"
since it gave him a much wider experience working
with written arrangements. When Joe Oliver left
town in 1919, Armstrong took Oliver's place in Kid
Ory's band, regarded as the top hot jazz band in
the city. 

In 1922, Armstrong joined the exodus to Chicago,
Illinois|Chicago, where he had been invited by Joe
"King" Oliver to join his Creole Jazz Band.
Oliver's band was the best and most influential
hot jazz band in Chicago in the early 1920s, at a
time when Chicago was the center of jazz. 
Armstrong made his first recordings,  including
taking some solos and breaks, while playing second
cornet in Oliver's band in 1923.

Armstrong was happy working with Oliver, but his
wife, pianist Lil Hardin Armstrong, urged him to
seek more prominent billing. He and Oliver parted
amicably in 1924 and Armstrong moved to New York
City to play with the Fletcher Henderson
Orchestra, the top African American band of the
day.  Armstrong switched to the trumpet to blend
in better with the other musicians in his section.
 During this time, he also made many recordings on
the side arranged by an old friend from New
Orleans, pianist Clarence Williams; these included
small jazz band sides (some of the best pairing
Armstrong with one of Armstrong's few rivals in
fiery technique and ideas, Sidney Bechet) and a
series of accompaniments for Blues singers.

He returned to Chicago in 1925 and began recording
under his own name with his famous Louis Armstrong
and his Hot Five|Hot Five and Louis Armstrong and
his Hot Seven|Hot Seven with such hits as "Potato
Head Blues", "Muggles" (a reference to marijuana,
for which Armstrong had a lifelong fondness), and
"West End Blues", the music of which set the
standard and the agenda for jazz for many years to
come. 

Armstrong returned to New York in 1929, then moved
to Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles in 1930,
then toured Europe. After spending many years on
the road, he settled permanently in Queens, New
York in  1943. Although subject to the
vicissitudes of Tin Pan Alley and the
gangster-ridden music business, he continued to
develop his playing. 

During the subsequent thirty years, Armstrong
played more than three hundred gigs a year. Most
of his touring after the late 1940s was with a
small stable group called the Louis Armstrong and
his All Stars|All Stars, which included Barney
Bigard, Jack Teagarden, Earl Hines, Trummy Young,
and Barrett Deems. During this period, he made
many recordings and appeared in over thirty films.

Armstrong kept up his busy tour schedule until a
few years before his death. While in his later
years, he would sometimes play some of his
numerous gigs by rote, but other times would
enliven the most mundane gig with his vigorous
playing, often to the astonishment of his band. He
also toured Africa, Europe, and Asia under
sponsorship of the United States Department of
State|US State Department with great success and
become known as "Ambassador Satch".

Armstrong died of a heart attack in 1971 at age
69. He was interred in the Flushing Cemetery,
Flushing, New York|Flushing, New York.

== Personality==
The nickname Satchmo or Satch is short for
Satchelmouth (describing his embouchure). Early on
he was also known as Dippermouth. These are all
references to his large mouth. Friends and fellow
musicians usually called him Pops, which is also
how Armstrong usually addressed his friends and
fellow musicians (except for Pops Foster, whom
Armstrong always called "George").


The "Satchmo" nickname and Armstrong's warm
Southern personality, combined with his natural
love of entertaining and evoking a response from
the audience, resulted in a public persona —
the grin, the sweat, the handkerchief — that
came to seem affected and even something of a
racism|racist caricature late in his career.  He
was also criticized for accepting the title of
"King of Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club|The
Zulus" (in the New Orleans African American
community an honored role as head of leading black
Carnival Krewe, but bewildering or offensive to
outsiders with their traditional costume of
grass-skirts and blackface makeup satirizing
southern white attitudes) for New Orleans Mardi
Gras|Mardi Gras 1949.

The seeming racial insensitivity of Armstrong's
King of the Zulus performance has sometimes been
seen as part of a larger failing on Armstrong's
part. Where some saw a gregarious and outgoing
personality, others saw someone trying too hard to
appeal to white audiences and essentially becoming
a minstrel show|minstrel caricature. Some
musicians criticized Armstrong for playing in
front of segregated audiences, and for not taking
a strong enough stand in the American Civil Rights
Movement (1955-1968)|civil rights movement
suggesting that he was an Uncle Tom. Billie
Holiday countered, however, "of course Pops toms,
but he toms with class."

Armstrong in fact was a major financial supporter
of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil
rights activists, but mostly preferred to work
quietly behind the scenes, not mixing his politics
with his work as an entertainer. The few
exceptions made it more effective when he did
speak out; Armstrong's criticism of President of
the United States|President Dwight D.
Eisenhower|Eisenhower, calling him "two-faced" and
"gutless" due to his inaction during the conflict
over school desegregation in Little Rock, Arkansas
in 1957 made national news. As a protest,
Armstrong cancelled a planned tour of the Soviet
Union on behalf of the State Department saying
"The way they're treating my people in the South,
the government can go to hell" and that he could
not represent his government abroad when it was in
conflict with its own people. 

He was an extremely generous man who was said to
have given away almost as much money as he kept
for himself. Armstrong was also greatly concerned
with his health and bodily functions. He made
frequent use of laxatives as a means of
controlling his weight, a practice he advocated
both to personal acquaintances and in the diet
plans he published under the title Lose Weight the
Satchmo Way.

==Music==

In his early years, Armstrong was best known for
his virtuosity with the cornet and trumpet. The
greatest trumpet playing of his early years can be
heard on his Hot Five and Hot Seven records. The
improvisations which he made on these records of
New Orleans jazz standards and popular songs of
the day, to the present time stack up brilliantly
alongside those of any other later jazz performer.
The older generation of New Orleans jazz musicians
often referred to their improvisations as
"variating the melody"; Armstrong's improvisations
were daring and sophisticated for the time while
often subtle and melodic. He often essentially
re-composed pop-tunes he played, making them more
interesting. Armstrong's playing is filled with
joyous, inspired original melodies, creative
leaps, and subtle relaxed or driving rhythms. The
genius of these creative passages is matched by
Armstrong's playing technique, honed by constant
practice, which extended the range, tone and
capabilities of the trumpet. In these records,
Armstrong almost single-handedly created the role
of the jazz soloist, taking what was essentially a
collective folk music and turning it into an art
form with tremendous possibilities for individual
expression.

Armstrong's work in the 1920s shows him playing at
the outer limits of his abilities. The Hot 5
records, especially, often have minor flubs and
missed notes, which do little to detract from
listening enjoyment since the energy of the
spontaneous performance comes through. By the mid
1930s Armstrong achieved a smooth assurance,
knowing exactly what he could do and carrying out
his ideas with perfectionism.

As his music progressed and popularity grew, his
singing also became important. Armstrong was not
the first to record scat singing, but he was
masterful at it and helped popularize it.  He had
a hit with his playing and scat singing on "Heebie
Jeebies", and sang out "I done forgot the words"
in the middle of recording "I'm A Ding Dong Daddy
From Dumas". Such records were hits and scat
singing became a major part of his performances.
Long before this, however, Armstrong was playing
around with his vocals, shortening and lengthening
phrases, interjecting improvisations, using his
voice as creatively as his trumpet.

During his long career he played and sang with the
most important instrumentalists and vocalists;
among the many, singing brakeman Jimmie Rodgers
(country singer)|Jimmie Rodgers, Bing Crosby, Duke
Ellington, Fletcher Henderson, Bessie Smith, and
notably with Ella Fitzgerald. Armstrong recorded
three albums with Fitzgerald: Ella & Louis, Ella &
Louis again, and Porgy and Bess for Verve Records.
 His recordings Satch Plays Fats, all Fats Waller
tunes, and Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy in the
1950s were perhaps the last of his great creative
recordings, but even oddities like Disney Songs
the Satchmo Way have their musical moments. For
the most part, however, his later output was
criticized as being overly simplistic or
repetitive.

Armstrong had many hit records including "Stardust
(song)|Stardust", "What a Wonderful World", "When
the Saints Go Marchin' In", "Dream a Little Dream
of Me", "Ain't Misbehavin'", and "Stompin' at the
Savoy".  "We Have All The Time In The World"
featured on the soundtrack of the James Bond film
On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and enjoyed
renewed popularity in the UK in 1994 when it
featured on a Guinness advert. It reached number 3
in the charts on being re-released.

In 1964 Armstrong knocked the Beatles off the top
of the charts with  "Hello, Dolly", and in 1968,
he had one last popular hit with the highly
sentimental pop song "What A Wonderful World". 
The song gained further currency in the popular
consciousness when it was used in the 1987 movie
Good Morning Vietnam, its subsequent rerelease
topping the charts around the world.  Saxophonist
Kenny G used it to record a virtual duet with
Armstrong in 1999.  In 2002, the song was used by
documentary film-maker Michael Moore in Bowling
for Columbine, accompanying a segment illustrating
military interventions by the United States around
the world.

Armstrong enjoyed many types of music, from the
most earthy blues to the syrupy sweet arrangements
of Guy Lombardo, to Latin American folksongs, to
classical symphonies and opera. Armstrong
incorporated influences from all these sources
into his performances, sometimes to the
bewilderment of fans who wanted Armstrong to stay
in convenient narrow categories. Armstrong was
inducted into Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as an
early influence. Some of his solos from the 1950s,
such as the rock and roll|hard rocking version of
"Saint Louis Blues (music)|Saint Louis Blues" from
the WC Handy album, show that the influence went
in both directions.

==Legacy ==

The influence of Armstrong on the development of
jazz is virtually immeasurable, but his
irrepressible personality both as a performer, and
later in his career as a public figure, was so
strong that to some it overshadowed his
contributions as a musician and singer. 

As a virtuoso trumpet player, Armstrong had a
unique tone and an extraordinary talent for
melodic improvisation. Through his playing, the
trumpet emerged as a solo instrument in jazz. He
was a masterful accompanist and ensemble player in
addition to his extraordinary skills as a soloist.
With his innovations, he raised the bar musically
for all who came after him.

Armstrong is considered to have essentially
invented jazz singing. He had an extremely
distinctive gravelly voice, which he deployed with
great dexterity as an improviser, bending the
lyrics and melody of a song for expressive
purposes. He was also greatly skilled at scat
singing, or wordless vocalizing. Before Armstrong,
singers simply sang the song; after him, they were
free to put their own stamp on it.

Armstrong appeared in more than a dozen Hollywood
films, though few of particular note, usually
playing a band leader or musician. He was the
first African American to host a nationally
broadcast radio show in the 1930s. He also made
assorted television appearances, especially in the
1950s and 1960s, including appearances on The
Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. 
Louis Armstrong has a record star on the Hollywood
Walk of Fame on 7601 Hollywood Blvd.

Many of Armstrong's recordings remain popular, and
decades after his death a larger number of his
recordings, from all years of his career, are in
print than at any time in his life. His songs are
broadcasted and listened everyday all around the
world, and are payed homage by various movies, tv
series, commercials, and even anime and computer
games. For example, the Armstrong song "A Kiss to
Build a Dream on" is used as the theme song for
the computer game Fallout 2, and the song "What a
Wonderful World" is featured in the Vandread
anime. His 1923 recordings with Joe King Oliver
and his Creole Jazz Band continue to be listened
to as documents of ensemble style New Orleans
jazz. All too often, however, Armstrong recorded
with stiff, standard orchestras leaving only his
sublime trumpet playing as of interest.
"Melancholy Blues," performed by  Armstrong and
his Hot Seven was included on the Voyager Golden
Record sent into outer space to represent one of
the greatest achievements of humanity.

Armstrong set up a non-profit foundation for
educating disadvantaged children in music, and
deeded his house and substantial archives of
writings, books, recordings, and memorabilia to go
to Queens College, New York after the deaths of
him and his wife Lucille. The Louis Armstrong
archives have been available to music researchers,
and his home in Corona, Queens opened to the
public as a museum on 15 October, 2003.

==Samples==
*Media:Ain't Misbehavin'.ogg|Download sample of
Armstrong singing "Ain't Misbehavin'", a song from
the 1929 Broadway theatre|Broadway revue Hot
Chocolate (136 Kb, 20 seconds)
*Media:April In Paris.ogg|Download sample of
"April in Paris" by Ella Fitzgerald with Armstrong

==Notes==
# note|birthdayArmstrong said he was not sure
exactly when he was born, but celebrated his
birthday on July 4. He usually gave the year as
1900 when speaking in public (although he used
1901 on his Social Security and other papers filed
with the government). Using Roman Catholic Church
documents from when his grandmother took him to be
baptised, New Orleans music researcher Tad Jones
established his birthday was August 4, 1901. With
various other collaborative evidence, this date is
now accepted by Armstrong scholars.

==References==
* Armstrong, Louis. Satchmo: My Life in New
Orleans. ISBN 0306802767
* Armstrong, Louis and Thomas Brothers. Armstrong,
in His Own Words: Selected Writings. ISBN
019514046X
* Cogswell, Michael. Armstrong: The Offstage
Story. ISBN 1888054816
* Meckna, Michael. Satchmo: The Louis Armstrong
Encyclopedia. ISBN 0313301379

==External links==

*
http://www.satchmo.com/louisarmstrong/quotes.html
Quotes and tributes
* http://www.satchography.com Discography
*
http://www.seeingblack.com/x040901/armstrong.shtml
Seeing Black jazz critic on the Uncle Tom question
* http://www.satchmo.net/ Satchmo.net, the
official website of the Louis Armstrong House &
Archives