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1. St Louis Blues (#1) 2:38 9. You Are My Lucky Star 2:52 17. I Hope Gabriel Likes My Music 3:09 Transfers and Production: David Lennick (W. C. Handy) (Nacio Herb Brown–Arthur Freed) (Dave Franklin) Digital Noise Reduction by Arthur Ka Wai Brunswick A 9683, mx 1478wpp Decca 580, mx 60022-A Decca 672, mx 60252-B Jenkins for K & A Productions Ltd. Recorded October–November 1934, Paris Recorded 3 October 1935, New York Recorded 19 December 1935, New York 2. Tiger Rag 3:02 10. I’ve Got My Fingers Crossed 2:25 18. The Music Goes ’Round And Around Producer’s Note (Nick La Rocca) (Jimmy McHugh–Ted Koehler) 3:12 The 1934 Paris recordings have had various Brunswick A 500490, mx 1479wpp Decca 623, mx 60155-D (Mike Riley–Eddie Farley–Red Hodgson) dates attached to them. Most sources give Recorded October–November 1934, Paris Recorded 21 November 1935, New York Decca 685, mx 60362-A October 1934; more recently, Tom Lord's Jazz 3. Will You Won’t You Be My Baby 2:44 11. Old Man Mose 2:29 Recorded 18 January 1936, New York Discography has dated them to 7 November. (Howard Quicksell–John Nesbitt) (Louis Armstrong–Zilner Randolph) 19. Rhythm Saved The World 2:56 Armstrong's first Decca records have a number 1 Brunswick A 500492, mx 1480 /2wpp Decca 622, mx 60156-D (Sammy Cahn–Saul Chaplin) of technical faults, particularly distortion and Recorded October–November 1934, Paris Recorded 21 November 1935, New York Decca 685, mx 60363-A wow, even on the best master pressings. A 4. On The Sunny Side Of The Street 5:53 12. (Was I To Blame For) Falling In Love Recorded 18 January 1936, New York number of the sides exist in multiple takes which are sonically identical, so it would appear that (Jimmy McHugh–Dorothy Fields) With You 3:02 All tracks Louis Armstrong & His Orchestra 1 1 some were dubbed in an attempt to solve the Brunswick A 500491, mx1481 /2,1482 /2wpp (Victor Young–Gus Kahn–M. Neuman) Vocals (tracks 1, 4-5, 7-19) by Louis Armstrong Recorded October–November 1934, Paris Decca 622, mx 60158-D problems of what were, for their time, unusually Original monochrome photo of Louis Armstrong loud recordings. Oddly enough the French 5. St Louis Blues (#2) 3:01 Recorded 21 November 1935, New York from Rue des Archives/Lebrecht Music engineers in 1934 had no such problems. (W. C. Handy) 13. I’m Shooting High 2:48 Brunswick A 500490, mx 1483wpp; (Jimmy McHugh-Ted Koehler) Recorded October–November 1934, Paris Decca 623, mx 60157-C 6. Song Of The Vipers 2:48 Recorded 21 November 1935, New York Also available in the Naxos Jazz Legends series ... (Louis Armstrong) 14. Thanks A Million 2:35 Brunswick A 500492, mx 1484wpp; (Gus Kahn-Arthur Johnston) Recorded October–November 1934, Paris Decca 666, mx 60249-A 7. Got A Bran’ New Suit 2:45 Recorded 19 December 1935, New York (Arthur Schwartz–Howard Dietz) 15. Solitude 2:56 Decca 579, mx 60024-B (Duke Ellington–Irving Mills–Eddie De Recorded 3 October 1935, New York Lange) 8. I’m In The Mood For Love 3:03 Decca 666, mx 60251-B (Jimmy McHugh–Dorothy Fields) Recorded 19 December 1935, New York Decca 579, mx 60021-F 16. Shoe Shine Boy 3:15 Recorded 3 October 1935, New York (Sammy Cahn–Saul Chaplin) Decca 672, mx 60250-A 8.120541* 8.120609* 8.120666* Recorded 19 December 1935, New York * Not available in the USA 5 8.120676 6 8.120676 120676bk Louis 3 20/3/03 3:24 pm Page 1

LOUIS ARMSTRONG 1938) in Kid Ory’s Brown Skinned Babies in Hot Five (by 1926 also dubbed Lil’s Hot Shots), Rhythm Band and at top venues in New York, aired in the 1931 Fox film-musical Careless Lady) Vol.3 1918 and from the following year worked with the revolutionary recording-studio group which Chicago, California and Culver City. Through his and his other hits included ‘Rockin’ Chair’ ‘Rhythm Saved The World’ Original Recordings 1934-1936 Fate Marable’s band on Mississippi riverboats comprised Louis and Lil, plus Ory on trombone, recordings an international audience for jazz was (No.14; a duet recorded with composer Hoagy, and made a name in clubs in and around New Johnny Dodds (1892-1940) on clarinet and created, and although the purists carped about a in 1929) and ‘Body And Soul’ (No.7). By 1933 Beatified alongside Ellington as a virtual by that city’s tradition of street-bands. As a child Orleans. In 1922 he joined King Oliver in Johnny St Cyr (1890-1966) on banjo and guitar. deliberate oversanitising of jazz for money’s sake, Louis was already a household name among synonym for Jazz, Louis left his indelible stamp he would follow their processions, blowing his Chicago as second cornet in his Creole Jazz Band Their earliest sessions enshrine for all time Louis’ a wider fraternity was captivated by the new popular vocalists on both sides of ‘the Pond’ and on all future developments of the ‘new’ medium. own tin whistle in sympathy, thus absorbing the at the newly-opened Lincoln Gardens and there brilliant attack and his rhythmic and melodic recipe on offer and, through global distribution that year his hits included ‘That’s My Home’ The most important single influence on classic ornate New Orleans style, naturally inheriting, as he made his first records (for Paramount and inventive-ness within the florid New Orleans of his discs, Louis was an international star well (No.17), ‘I Gotta Right To Sing The Blues’ jazz, ‘America’s Ambassador of Good Will’ Blesh reminds us, the honours of his two most Gennett) and met his future second wife, the framework, and from these discs, the first in a before he set foot outside of the States. (No.18) and St. Louis Blues (an uncharted re- series seminal in the history of recorded small commercialised Jazz on records and, if he did not illustrious jazz cornet predecessors, Bolden and Memphis-born, university-trained pianist, band- ‘Ain’t Misbehavin’ (from the 1929 Broadway recording of his 1930 hit), while his list for 1935 thereby actually ‘save the world’, he certainly Keppard. Fortuitously, on New Year’s Eve 1912 group jazz, Armstrong the mature soloist already leader and composer Lil Hardin (1898-1971). musical Hot Chocolates), marked Louis’ shift included cover-versions of You Are My Lucky shines out. While 1927 brought the formation altered it for the better with his rhythm. (according to the story later perpetuated by (See Naxos Jazz Legends 8.120666: King Oliver). towards Armstrong the populist, relegating Louis of the more gramophonically commercial Hot Star (No.6 – from Broadway Melody Of 1935) and Variously trumpet virtuoso, singer, bandleader Armstrong himself in Satchmo – My Life In New the trumpet virtuoso to second place. A new Hardin cajoled Louis towards better things and, Seven, from 1926 Louis had also been a star I’m In The Mood For Love (No.3 – from Every and ‘Satchmo’ the film-actor and comedian all in Orleans), the street-wise but over-exuberant addition to the roster of talkie feature films (in at her instigation, in 1924 he quit Oliver to join a attraction and front-man with the Carroll Night At Eight). In 1936, Louis made his own one, Armstong the colossus overwhelmed and youth was branded a delinquent for firing a 1930, with a cameo in Ex-flame), on records his larger outfit run by his old friend Fletcher Dickerson band at the Savoy Ballroom and in first significant film appearance (in Pennies From bestrode all: Jazz’s first real star soloist and its stepfather’s pistol into the air “within the city chosen numbers included the very latest from Henderson (1897-1952) at New York’s Roseland June 1928 he took back to the studio a Heaven, for Columbia), while his hits on disc self-styled Ambassador, he remains its most limits” and soon found himself remanded to the Cotton Club revue, while new compositions by Ballroom, then fast becoming a prestigious high- revamped Hot Five recruited from the Dickerson included I Hope Gabriel Likes My Music (at immortal persona. More specifically, as one of Coloured Waifs’ Home. This silver-lined cloud Harold Arlen, Hoagy Carmichael and Fields & society venue. With the noted Georgia-born outfit. At these sessions sides were recorded No.13) and a cover of Thanks A Million (title- the greatest of jazz individualists, a technical provided him with the golden opportunity to McHugh were immortalised by his fun-loving, pianist, songwriter and arranger, Louis found which, according to Burnett James, “for song of a 20th Century Fox ‘political musical’ master with a creative imagination, he provided practise and master the cornet, courtesy of the accessible, rasping delivery. In 1932 he scored a ample opportunities for solo playing – he was invention and imagination” remain unmatched in starring Dick Powell). the formative force to jazz trumpeters. Brush Home’s governor, Captain Jones, who also ran US No.1 hit with his version of All Of Me (the aside the hokum and he still towers among the its brass band. However, according to the featured solo by Henderson at the Apollo and jazz history (see Naxos Jazz Legends 8.120541: Seymour Simons-Gerald Marks standard first Peter Dempsey, 2003 most influential musicians of the 20th century, reliable account of Buddy Bolden’s one-time Roxy theatres and at this time recorded not only Louis Armstrong Vol.1). with Henderson but also with Clarence Williams’ an artist and entertainer whose simple yet trumpet sideman Bunk Johnson (1889-1949), By the early 1930s Louis’ characteristic hokum dynamic art broke through barriers, traversed Louis had already for some time been “fooling Blue Five and blues singers including Bessie Personnel Smith and Ma Rainey. However, the larger and scatting was already becoming big business: borders and disarmed enemies both real and around with my cornet every chance he could more ubiquitous, almost de rigueur, they were October–November 1934: 3 October, 21 November, 13 & 19 December ensemble – which worked from arranged music – metaphorical. get”. So we should thank Johnson for “showing commercially encouraged features of many of his Louis Armstrong, Jack Hamilton, Leslie 1935, & 18 January 1936: was a far cry from the more intimate, Daniel Louis Armstrong was born on 4 August him how to play the Blues” and Jones for recordings. His new vocal style, already much Thompson, trumpets; Lionel Guimaraes, Louis Armstrong, Leonard Davis, Gus Aiken, spontaneous Oliver ensemble. 1901 in the Perdido district of New Orleans. teaching him the dots. imitated and in demand in all the right circles trombone; Peter Duconge, clarinet, alto sax; Louis Bacon, trumpets; Harry White, Despite the dire poverty of his upbringing (the Leaving the Home at fourteen, Louis worked as During early 1925 Lil returned to Chicago to was a salient – and saleable – feature of a much- Henry Tyree, alto sax; Alfred Jimmy Archey, trombones; Henry Jones, child of a broken home, he was raised by his an odd-job man but, in the company of Bechet form her own New Orleans-orientated band at prized stage persona. During 1930, Louis Pratt, tenor sax; Herman Chittison, piano; Charlie Holmes, alto sax; Bingie Madison, mother and a variety of surrogate fathers), in and others, became one of the finest cornet the Dreamland and in October of that year guested with Luis Russell at Washington (DC)’s Maceo Jefferson, guitar; German clarinet, tenor sax; Greely Walton, tenor sax; ‘Black Storyville’ Louis grew up surrounded by players in and around Storyville, the New Louis, now billed ‘The World’s Greatest Jazz Howard Theatre and, after transferring from Arago, bass; Oliver Tines, drums Luis Russell, piano; Lee Blair, music and, like his New Orleans contemporary Orleans red-light district. He replaced his Cornettist’, joined Lil’s Dreamland Syncopators, Connie’s Inn to New York’s Cocoanut Grove, guitar; Pops Foster, bass; Paul Barbarin, Sidney Bechet, his youthful imagination was fired youthful idol and mentor Joe ‘King’ Oliver (1885- an improvisational group which spawned the appeared in Baltimore with the Mills Blue drums, vibraphone

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LOUIS ARMSTRONG Vol.3 ARMSTRONG LOUIS 8.120676