Louis Armstrong

Louis Armstrong

Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong was one of the most popular musicians of his time. Upon initiating my research, I was surprised to find conflicting dates as to when he was born. Encarta Africa said he was born in 1901, 1001 things to know about African American history-1898, regular Encarta --1900, "Little Louis and the jazz band" by Angela Shelf Medearis says his date of birth is August 4, 1901. The book "Jazz Stars" by Richard Rennert states that Louis Armstrong was born in 1899, the book "Louis Armstrong" by Sam Tanenhaus says he was born on July 4, 1900. The reason why they have so many different dates is due to the fact that he probably wasn't born in a hastpital and they did not use to keep good records of black people's birthdays. So for accuracy sake, we can say he was born in the end of the 1800's, or the beginning of the 1900's.

Louis Armstrong was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. His mother, Mary Albert was a 15 or 16 year old prostitute. He lived with his mother, whom he called Mayann, and his younger sister, Beatrice, whom he called Mama Lucy, and his grandmother. His Father, William Armstrong, seldom visited little Louis.

Ever since he was seven years old, Little Louis worked after school to help his mother. He sold buckets of coal late into the night. During that time people used coal for heating and for cooking. He blew a tin party horn so that everyone knew that he had coal for sale. He found that if he took the wooden mouthpiece off the end of the horn and used two fingers over the end of the mouthpiece hole, he could play a tune. He wanted a real trumpet but he was to poor to buy one.

Louis Armstrong's neighborhood was poor but lively. The men on the waterfront bellowed out rhythmic word...

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...music, and a peppery seasoning of ragtime. A little bit of the blues was added for good measure.

As the years passed, more musicians started to pay attention to Louis. They started to call him "Satchelmouth" because of his large teeth and smile. Soon "Stchmo" was his nickname. King Oliver was especially kind to Louis. He let Louis fill in for him while he rested between songs, and if he had to many music engagements, he sent Louis to fill in for him. Louis found a job driving a coal cart in the day, but at night he was a first class jazz musician. In 1917 Joe "King" Oliver leaves Kid Ory"s orchestra; and Louis replaces him. Louis loved playing in Kid Ory's band. He would sail up and down the Mississippi River playing for the parties and dances. He learned how to read music and soon Louis was righting his own songs. IN 1918 he married Daisy Parker.