Birth Data
|
| Birth Date: |
8/4/1901 (Aug. 4,
1901) |
| Birth Time: |
22:00 (10:00 PM) CST
(+6:00) |
| Birth Place: |
New Orleans,
LA |
| Latitude /
Longitude: |
29 N 57 / 90 W
04 |
| Rodden Rating /
Source: |
A / News report |
| Source Notes: |
PBS Documentary, "Satchmo" 7/1993, quotes records, date
from baptismal certificate and time from accounts that, during his
birth, a brawl was raging outside his mom's house in which a man was
stabbed to death. The event was traced to this date, 10:00 PM.
For many years, Armstrong's birth date was given as July 4, 1900,
with a time quoted from his mother as "before midnight,"
but the estimable writer Gary Giddins discovered the birth
certificate that proves Armstrong was born Aug. 4, 1901.
Author and educator Krin Gabbard writes, "He seems to have
been unaware that he was born in August 4, 1901 rather than July 4,
1900. We only know the facts now because jazz researcher Tad Jones
found Armstrong's actual birth certificate at the Sacred Heart of
Jesus Church on Lopez Street in New Orleans several years after
Armstrong's death. Armstrong's mother, Mary Albert (better known as
Mayann), was unmarried and no more than sixteen years old when her
only son was born, so she may have had good reason not to recall the
exact circumstances of his birth."
Biographies: Laurence Bergreen, "Louis Armstrong: An
Extravagant Life". Gary Giddins, "Satchmo".
|
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Biography
American jazz trumpeter, a raspy voiced singer and band leader who was
known as the great "Satchmo" for Satchelmouth, the size of his
mouth. His infectious huge grin made him lovable to people everywhere and
he was known for his sense of humor and vivid energy. Armstrong is the
most important improviser of jazz of his day with his perfect pitch and
immaculate timing and he taught the world to swing. Innovation and
excitement marked his style of the music that is distinctly American, born
in the black quarters of New Orleans. With a record of top-ten hits in
every decade for half a century, Armstrong is memorable for "Hello,
Dolly," and "When The Saints go Marchin' In," as well as
his classics, "Weather Bird" and "What a Wonderful
World."
Armstrong grew up poor among prostitutes and lowlifes in New Orleans,
working from the time he was a kid to help his family. He sang on the
street corners in the Old Quarter and taught himself to play the cornet,
quickly becoming acquainted with the culture of music that could be heard
on every street. His first big breakthrough in music actually came from an
arrest at age 11. He was arrested and put in the Home for Colored Waifs
for firing a pistol on New Year's Eve. Here he received his first formal
instruction in the cornet. He rose from a rough and tumble childhood to
become one of the first black men in America who had the courage and clout
to say, "I wouldn't play no place I couldn't stay." At age 21,
he was the talk of South Side Chicago, playing in his mentor's band, Joe
"King" Oliver's Creole Jazz Band. So popular were the trademark
two-cornet breaks he and Oliver worked out, that they would perform with
handkerchiefs over their hands to hide their fingering from
imitators.
At age 41, his records and movie appearances had made him world famous.
He had a rigorous schedule of touring, recording and performing, gradually
adding films and TV.
Somehow, Armstrong stayed down to earth, never moving any further into
drugs than his daily hits of marijuana, which never seemed to hurt his
playing. He was, however, known as a world-class eccentric, his own man,
brash and irreverent. His talents as a virtuoso trumpet player and
irrepressible stage personality were inseparable, as was his mugging,
teeth baring and eye-rolling.
An unabashed sensualist, Armstrong loved pretty women and ate rich
food: he married four times. His first marriage was to Daisy Parker, a
prostitute, in 1918. Joe Oliver moved to Chicago that year and Louis took
his place in the Kid Ory band. He and Daisy separated in 1922. In February
1924, he married Lil Hardin, the pianist in the King Oliver's Creole Jazz
Band. He joined the Fletcher Henderson in New York City that September and
cut his first recordings with Henderson's orchestra.
On 11/12/1925, Armstrong made his first records as a leader with his
own group, "Louis Armstrong and His Hot Five." He and Lil
separated in August 1931.
From July to November 1932, Armstrong made his first tour outside of
the U.S., traveling to the UK. After European tours the next few years,
Joe Glaser became his manager in 1935 and remained so for the rest of
Louis's life.
In October 1938, he married Alpha Smith. They were together for a few
years before he met and married Lucille Wilson, his fourth and last wife,
on 10/12/1942. They were together for 29 years. Lucille was a dancer at
the Cotton Club where his band had a running engagement. The following
year, they purchased a home in Corona, Queens, where they lived for the
rest of their lives. It was his first "real" home and meant to
Armstrong that he had a haven and focus to his life.
He died in his sleep on 7/06/1971. Up to the last few days before his
death, he was rehearsing for the next performance before his beloved
public.
The Queen's College Louis Armstrong Archive, in Flushing, NY, has some
5,000 photographs, 84 scrapbooks and 350 pages of autobiographical
writings, as well as 650 reels of audiotape.
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