Louis Armstrong and The Clarinet

Louis Armstrong and the Clarinet
Author(s): Brian Harker

Source: American Music, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Summer, 2003), pp. 137-158
Published by: University of Illinois Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3250562
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BRIAN HARKER
Louis Armstrong
and the Clarinet
Confronted with Louis Armstrong's rising celebrity in the 1920s, Kid

Rena, an old rival from New Orleans, reacted with jealous resent-
ment: "And because Louis [is] up North making records and run-
ning up and down like he's crazy don't mean he's that great. He is
not playing cornet on that horn; he is imitating a clarinet."' For mu-
sic historians the last part of this statement has a familiar ring, call-
ing to mind the transfer of idioms in baroque music, in which, for
example, the violin imitates the voice or the harpsichord appropri-
ates lute-based style brise or violinistic figuration.2 Jazz writers rou-
tinely acknowledge the influence of leading soloists-especially Arm-
strong and Charlie Parker-on players of other instruments. But the
transfer of instrumental as opposed to personal idioms has received
less attention. For instance, even though for at least twenty years
scholars have noted Armstrong's fascination with the clarinet, most
writers continue to view his unorthodox early style as the simple
product of genius.3 To be sure, the clarinet was not the only outside
influence; scholars have connected Armstrong with sources as dis-
parate as Italian opera and New Orleans drummers.4 If we overlook
the role of the clarinet, however, we will misunderstand a fundamen-
tal aspect of Armstrong's early musical development. For all his bit-
terness, Kid Rena knew what he was talking about. It was Rena, af-
ter all, who saw the interest in clarinet style take root in the first
Brian Harker is assistant professor of music at Brigham Young University,

Provo, Utah. He received the 1999 Irving Lowens Award for his article, "'Tell-
ing a Story': Louis Armstrong and Coherence in Early Jazz," published by
Current Musicology. His research interests include jazz, blues, gospel, and other
African American musical genres.
American Music Summer 2003
@ 2003 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
138 Harker
place, as he and A
growing up on the
New Orleans Rivalries
Although as a teenager Armstrong loved playing the cornet, he seems

to have felt constricted by its traditional role as bearer of the melody
or "lead." "When I was a kid in New Orleans," he said, "I used to do
a whole lot of figurations. Man, I was crazy on that."5 Armstrong's
manner of playing baffled the older generation. Brass band trombonist
Charles "Sunny" Henry exclaimed, "I didn't never understand Lou-
is Armstrong, because that son-of-a-gun, he ... didn't care what you
played.... He would play a obbligato all the time; be off [the melo-
dy], you understand."6 King Oliver, who occasionally gave cornet les-
sons to Armstrong, would come around the honky-tonks and rebuke
him for playing figurations rather than the melody.7 But Armstrong
was not alone in his subversive tendencies. He was part of a rising
generation of cornet players who were not wholly content to follow
the well-worn path. Rivalry and experimentation led them to novel
tricks, techniques, and, ultimately, a new style of playing.8
In 1919 Ernest "Punch" Miller (b. 1894), a cornet player from Race-
land, Louisiana, arrived in New Orleans after being discharged from
the military. He immediately fell in with a group of cornetists that
included Henry "Kid" Rena (b. 1898), Buddy Petit (b. 1897), and Arm-
strong (b. 1901), as well as slightly older players Chris Kelly (b. 1885
or 1890) and Sam Morgan (b. 1887). These players used to have reg-
ular "bucking" or "carving" contests. Seated in horse-drawn wagons,
their bands would meet on a streetcorner. Someone would chain the
wagons' wheels together and the cornet players would duel back and
forth until one of them gave up. Later in life, Armstrong admitted he
did not win every contest: "Buddy Petit-Kid Rena-all of us young-
sters used to meet on the corners in the advertising wagons and do
some carving. Of course we all had our moments, because we were
all good at blowing our cornets. So if Buddy carved me once it's OK
by me."9
In a series of interviews from 1957 to 1960 Miller spoke extensive-
ly about this group of cornetists, comparing their styles in some de-
tail. He noted, first of all, that the "old-time" cornet players didn't
play as many notes as later players did, preferring instead to "lin-
ger" on the blues. Presumably Miller had in mind players like Bunk
Johnson, Joe Oliver, Mutt Carey, and Sugar Johnny Smith, most of
whom employed an arsenal of mutes to enhance their bluesy ap-
proach. When interviewer Richard B. Allen asked who brought about
the change to a more voluble style, Miller said, "It come along in our
Louis Armstrong and the Clarinet 139
time-Buddy [Petit], [Kid] Rena, all of us."1o Who was the best a
fingering"? "They claim I was," said Miller." Others rememb
na's technical agility as being particularly impressive. New O
banjo and guitar player Lawrence Marrero recalled that "in t
times, the '20s and thereabout, Kid Rena was the jazziest. Fast f
ing and lots of notes. Sam Morgan played the sweetest, and
Kelly was the king of 'ratty' low-down music [the blues]. When
would meet on corners, having music battles... Rena would
his good friend Kelly to leave, as Kelly couldn't take care of th
ers, but Rena could."12
Armstrong thrived in the new arena of technical virtuosit
deed, he and Rena regularly met in congenial but intense co
tion. "Louis and Henry used to buck every time they met,
trombonist Preston Jackson. "They were keen rivals."13 The riv
began early, for Armstrong and Rena learned to play cornet to
er in the Colored Waifs' Home for Boys, the local reform s
There may also have been a socioeconomic component. Rena,
French name was originally spelled Rend, may have descended f
a Creole family in downtown New Orleans. According to or
tories, the long-standing competition between uptown "black
downtown Creoles flourished even in Armstrong's day.14 Arms
may have been alluding to this complex social tension when
scribed the carving contests between him and Rena: "Sometime
would play together, but often we would blow against each
He would be playing for some dance downtown, and I wou
playing for some dance uptown, and when the two bands m
street parade to advertise the dance, we would have a contest
there, and the best band would get the crowd. Kid Rena and
to have some awful battles!""15
Fast fingering was not the only weapon wielded in such confl
the two players tried to best each other in the upper register a
This, too, was a departure from the practice of earlier cornet p
who, according to violinist Peter Bocage, "didn't use too many h
notes" in the old days.16 "Like myself," Armstrong recalled in
"Rena had a very high range on his horn, and today these youn
think they're making high notes, but I tell them, they'll never h
high notes that Kid Rena and I used to when we were in our
Rena could all but whistle through that cornet of his, but then
chops were always pretty strong too."17 Rena might have enjoy
advantage over Armstrong in the upper register. Miller said that
Kelly and Rena "could hit higher notes than could even old
Oh yeah, way above Louis."18 Elsewhere Miller claimed that
could play as high as B-flat above high C-nearly an octave
the cornet's conventional range in the early part of the century
140 Harker
According to oral
of Armstrong's st
extended range-m
group of New Orle
what stimulated t
that Armstrong, a
with the playing s
rived in New Orl
them days."20 Tha
is evident from th
cornet. In his auto
now well-known s
obbligato to the m
der who attracted
1910s.21 One day,
ble him: "You thin
the corner from m
Bechet followed W
the solo on the co
wrote, "and really
Louis, he did it."22
ing band represen
melodies assigned
Armstrong would
mental technique
Just as Armstron
the same to Armst
I heard Sidney Bec
strong recalled. W
Day parade, Armst
blowing like crazy
and I followed him
Orleans like him."2
but extraordinar
time-advertising f
accompanied Arm
may have been un
petitive instincts
clarinet style in a
After Bechet mov
clarinet lines. Som
ing year Armstro
records, mostly of
Punch Miller, Arm
Example 1. High Society, clarinet obbligato as played by Johnny Dodds w

King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band (June 22, 1923).
121 = ca. 224
3 3
%W-~~i :J in
3 3
...... rji 'F - - ,

(tbone break)
O O p F- Ig
Jv V M wLw
3V"---,-1IIIrI I' MI I- F w" " '
rr
3 3 3
r tag I
* Wrong note (should be Bb)
inet Marmalade, originally played by Larry Shields (ex. 2).

ler, Armstrong's ability to play (or interest in playing) the
to Clarinet Marmalade set him apart from the others in h
cornet-playing friends. Despite Miller's claim to be kn
best" at fast fingering, he admitted that Armstrong "
some... stuff that was different from all of the rest of us." As one
example of that difference Miller cited Clarinet Marmalade; Armstrong,
he claimed, was the "first" (cornetist?) he ever heard play the tune.
As demonstrated on trumpet by Miller in the interview, the passage
Armstrong learned was taken from the second strain, or trio, of the
ODJB recording. This passage contradicts conventional assumptions
about instrumental roles in New Orleans jazz bands. It is traditional-
ly held that the cornet played the melody or "lead," the clarinet
played faster obbligatos in the upper register, and the trombone
played slower countermelodies in the lower register. Indeed, in many
classic New Orleans recordings by King Oliver and Jelly Roll Mor-
142 Harker
Example 2. Clarinet
Larry Shields in the
53 = ca. 252
0)
0)
I IV I I L t L I Ivt t p / / ._1 i" I I - I
ton, these generalizations hold true. But in the trio from C

malade, the roles are switched around: the clarinet play
melody line shown in example 2, while the cornet and tr
ter an initial barrage of counterpoint by the trombone) pl
harmony notes. Armstrong must have been attracted to
clarinet lead on this recording, with its rocking half-ste
leaps, and determined to learn it himself.
The clarinet idiom also seems to have inspired the yo
ists to expand their ranges. In an interview from 1960 H
brother Joe, who initially played clarinet, took credit for get
to start playing in the upper register. Joe would play hig
inet and Henry would try to match the notes he heard. Jo
to file down the rim of Henry's mouthpiece in order to
lower and thus easier to play high. Later, when Joe switc
drums, the clarinetist in their band, Zeb Leneries, would
clarinet the high notes Henry played on his cornet and a
pitch names.28 Others immediately recognized the source
innovation. Punch Miller remarked that Rena "played
there like he's playin' clarinet."29 According to Joe Rena
"copied" Henry in playing high notes, even to the point of
his mouthpiece.30
Both Armstrong and early listeners acknowledged the c
fluence on his style. Referring to Armstrong's performa
sissippi riverboats in 1921, Jerome Don Pasquall, a St. Lou
recalled: "When we first heard Louis, it was a revelation. To us we
thought there was no jazz trumpet as good as Charlie Creath. Char-
lie used to swing a lead in such a way that he never got too far away
from the melody, whereas Louis, with all that terrific technique of his
(like clarinet almost), would play so many notes you'd be thrilled and
forget all about the melody."31 In an interview from 1970, Armstrong
said of his teenage years in New Orleans: "I was like a clarinet play-
er, like the guys run up and down the horn nowadays, boppin' and
things. I was doin' all that, fast fingers and everything."32 In 1965
Armstrong recalled that in the honky-tonks, "I'd play eight bars and
I was gone .. clarinet things; nothing but figurations and thing

that.... Running all over the horn."33
Recorded Evidence
Armstrong continued pressing the conventional boundaries of the

cornet after moving north in 1922. But as in New Orleans, he was not
the only one sampling the idioms of other instruments. Other cornet
and trumpet players evidently emulated woodwind parts as well.
And New York trombonist Jimmy Harrison imitated Armstrong,
memorizing his solos and even learning harmony parts to his lead
lines. Observing the exchange of traditional instrumental roles, co-
median and early jazz pianist Jimmy Durante quipped, "The trom-
bone's playing the trumpet, the trumpet's playing the clarinet and the
clarinet's playing the horses."34
The influence of the clarinet is audible in the earliest recordings
Armstrong made, with King Oliver in 1923 and Fletcher Henderson
in 1924 and 1925. Arpeggios constitute a vital link. Far more than oth-
er jazz instrumentalists, New Orleans clarinetists played melodic
embellishments and descant obbligatos that relied heavily on arpeg-
gios.35 Armstrong himself adopted an arpeggiated manner for his first
recorded solo, on Chimes Blues (1923) (ex. 3). This solo has often been
viewed as an oddity. Because of its repetitiveness and predictability,
Hughes Panassie and James Lincoln Collier even think that Oliver
composed the solo and assigned it to Armstrong.36 That may be, but
Oliver rarely if ever exhibited such pervasive arpeggiation in his own
solos. It seems more likely that Armstrong contrived the solo him-
self, probably before the recording session. The single-minded repe-
tition of the opening arpeggio suggests that Armstrong was experi-
menting with an aspect of clarinet style, perhaps too self-consciously.
Example 3. Chimes Blues, Armstrong's solo, first half (April 6, 1923).

= ca. 168
77 C Ab C C7
II.
F F#0 C A7
D7 G7 C
Arop i ,.
144 Harker
This speculation se
worked out in adv
this period. His fa
Chop Suey, record
copyright deposit
Collier rightly obs
opening from the
the telltale sign of
tion, which employ
leans clarinet style
arpeggios (ex. 4). T
ists such as Lorenz
pears frequently
(1923), Go 'Long Mu
In light of these ex
posed the harmon
Blues (1923) (ex. 6).
minished seventh a
tour. Armstrong, a
whose main melo
style. Arpeggios of
gestive of clarinet
solo performances,
recordings with He
2), Naughty Man (b
But why should ar
Arpeggios are diffi
between chord tone
wind column, and
finger-key. Classic
ble problems of d
play arpeggios rapi
all Armstrong, ha
needed to acquire s
Oliver, Freddie Kep
and Bubber Miley-
comparable to Arm
Example 4. Armstron
posit, Jan. 18, 1924;
= ca. 200
\'?
Example 5. Sawtooth arpeggios in the breaks of Lorenzo Tio Jr., John

Dodds, and Armstrong.
a. Lorenzo Tio Jr., Bouncing Around (Dec. 3, 1923); transcribed by Charle
Kinzer.
34
b. Johnny Dodds, Buddy's Habit (Oct. 5/15, 1923).

= ca. 216
43
c. Armstrong, Tears (Oct. 5/15, 1923).
j= ca. 208
81 E Cm
Eb Gm
d. Armstron
92 = ca. 224
e. Armstrong, Shanghai Shuffle, take 2 (Nov. 7,

71 .= ca. 228
A~
M I I)
Example 6. Harmonized cornet in

by King Oliver and Armstrong (A
= ca. 176
gm1 p 5 1 1 O
146 Harker
Example 7. Nonsawto
Tell me, Dreamy Eyes
93 = ca. 232
Words, take 2
39 = ca. 216
Naughty Man, take 1

106 = ca. 192
Naughty Man, take 2

114 = ca. 216
I Miss My Swiss
153 J= ca. 116
6 . . , . . f"l " , . "

3 3
"t 2 R I.. . -a PE " - - 1-.4 iF
Though commonplace on the clarinet, such lines must have astound-

ed listeners when played on the traditionally less nimble cornet.
The freshness of Armstrong's arpeggios would have made them
economically viable. In the early 1920s vaudeville entertainment val-
ues shaped the aesthetic world of jazz musicians. To satisfy the uni-
versal demand for "novelty," jazz soloists were expected to provoke
laughter or astonishment, particularly during breaks. The older gen-
eration-King Oliver and his contemporaries-met this requirement
by cultivating a "freak" or "trick" school of cornet playing, using
muted devices to create "wah-wah" sounds and other strange or com-
ical effects. Armstrong, who idolized Oliver and naturally wanted to
replicate his success, initially tried to carry on the freak tradition. His
wife, pianist Lil Hardin, said, "At first when [Louis] was working with
King Oliver he wanted to play as King [did]."39 Once he spent an en-
tire week trying in vain to learn Oliver's famous wah-wah solo on
Dippermouth Blues (1923), while Hardin accompanied on the piano.
"He just couldn't work his hand quite right to get all the wah-wahs,"
wrote New Orleans researcher Bill Russell.40 "Louis never could play
that solo like Joe," Hardin recalled. "And I think it kind of discour-
aged him because Joe was his idol and he wanted to play like Joe."41
It was just as well, of course, for Armstrong's arpeggios had at lea

as much novelty potential as wah-wahs. When he arrived from New
Orleans in 1922, "Louis upset Chicago," recalled clarinetist Bust
Bailey. What distinguished his playing? "His execution, for on
thing," said Bailey.42 Jazz musicians used the word "execution"
mean technical agility, a quality that would have been especially ev
dent in Armstrong's arpeggiated lines.43 Although early contempo
raries do not mention his arpeggios per se, one New Orleans cornet
ist was impressed enough to experiment himself with Armstron
innovation. In 1925 Tommy Ladnier, a musician one year older than
Armstrong, played what was for him an uncharacteristic break on
blues tune, Don't Shake It No More (1925) that stiffly, though unm
takably, copies Armstrong's first break on Tears (ex. 8).
Example 8. On Don't Shake It No More (1925), Tommy Ladnier borrows Ar

strong's break on Tears (1923).
Armstrong (1923)
Ladnier (1925)
Arpeggios did not exhaust the clarinet idiom. Armstrong sometim

appropriated another distinctive aspect of clarinet style: runni
eighth notes. The clearest and lengthiest early examples are ag
from "composed" works-that is, works that Armstrong wrote dow
and submitted as copyright deposits before recording them. The m
melodies of Cornet Chop Suey and Weatherbird Rag (copyrighted 19
for example, manifest a speed, fluidity, and continuity more typic
of clarinet obbligatos than cornet lead-lines. There is little qualitat
difference in these recordings between Armstrong's leads and Johnn
Dodds's obbligatos, apart from the hierarchical relationship of melo
dy and harmony (ex. 9).44 Even on melodic paraphrases Armstro
grafted an "eight-to-the-bar" rhythmic conception that made his s
los far more active than those of his peers. A comparison of paraphr
es by Armstrong and Oliver on Froggie Moore (1923) will demonstr
this point (ex. 10). For the first eight bars Armstrong adheres most
to the pitches of the melody. But in doing so he deflects his suppres
energy into the channel of rhythm, dashing off eighth-note pick-u
and restless syncopations. In the second eight bars, evidently unab
to contain himself any longer, he bursts into elaborate falling figur
decorating the melody. Armstrong's solo contrasts sharply with 01
148 Harker
Example 9. Cornet Ch
strong and Johnny D
J= ca. 176
5 Dodds
Armstrong
Example 10. Froggie Moore, trio, comparison of Armstrong's and Oliver's lead
styles (April 6, 1923).
j = ca. 200
Armstrong (mm.83-98)
Oliver (mm.115-130)
87
119
91
95 Break
127
iver's immediately subsequent statement of the lead, with its consc

entious melodic clarity and repetitive, predictable rhythms.
Armstrong's solo on Froggie Moore contains other clarinet-style
ements as well. Armstrong took an important step toward an abstr
solo style by attaching arpeggios to preset melodies.45 This is obvi
ous on heavily arpeggiated melodic paraphrases from the mid-twen
ties like Oriental Strut (1926), but the practice began much earlier.
the second eight bars of Froggie Moore, for example, Armstrong tw
embellishes the melody with falling arpeggios (mm. 91, 93). Anoth
possible aspect of clarinet style is a rocking stepwise figure (mm. 9
and 95-96), which Jeffrey Magee has identified as one of five rhy
mic-melodic formulas common in Armstrong's early solos. Th
eighth-note rhythms and embellishing nature of the figure relate
to the clarinet, but there is also a more direct connection: the rocki
figure is the central motive in the passage of Clarinet Marmalade th
Armstrong learned as a youth. To mediate between arpeggiated
stepwise embellishments of the melody, Armstrong employed anoth
rocking figure, one that alternated by thirds (m. 94). Rocking step
and rocking thirds served the convenient purpose of animating an
varying the melody with a minimum of added invention. Both figur
appear frequently in Armstrong's early paraphrases.
Blurred Boundaries
Armstrong's experimentation with clarinet style blurred the bound-

aries between the traditional roles of clarinet and cornet, and in turn
between the musical functions of obbligato and melody, solo and lead.
This blurring had the effect of altering the balance of power, so to
speak, among horn players in New Orleans bands. If the cornetist
typically carried the melody in such groups, the clarinetist was the
true "prima donna," the one who played the flashiest ensemble lines
and the most solos.46 By borrowing the idiom of clarinetists, Arm-
strong provoked a variety of responses from them ranging from co-
operation to competition to acquiescence. This is evident in his re-
cordings with the two leading New Orleans clarinetists of the 1920s
-Sidney Bechet and Johnny Dodds.
Armstrong and Bechet first recorded together in 1924-25, as part
of two recording bands organized by New Orleans pianist Clarence
Williams: Clarence Williams's Blue Five and the Red Onion Jazz Ba-
bies. Judging from these recordings, Armstrong and Bechet shared an
unusually intimate relationship in musical settings-rivaled only,
perhaps, by Armstrong's rapport on the bandstand with King Oliv-
er. In fact, on the Blue Five and Red Onion sides Bechet exerts an au-
thority similar to Oliver's with the Creole Jazz Band. On one occa-
150 Harker
sion Armstrong eve

Oliver. During the
er's rendition (with
Baby (1924), Armst
ody, harmonizing
unprecedented, th
shows Armstrong's
Armstrong also ma
to that with Olive
them with his own
a break in the secon
Moaner Blues (192
break, but here Bec
Armstrong finishe
and the tone colors
easily be missed in
not sound particu
pared." Whether or
provised, it reveals
In addition to a def
strong could some
Bechet and vice ver
petition becomes m
Walking Babies from
the vocal duet by A
sion, the Red Onion
the piece. Sixteen m
strong plays an eig
but not one of his
chorus begins, Bech
situde. Bechet launc
or and confidence t
in the background.
tle importance besi
in having "carved"
in this last chorus:
taunt directed at the other bandmembers who had faded in his wake.
Example 11. Texas Moaner Blues, break "shared" by Sidney Bechet and Arm-
strong (Oct. 17, 1924).
= ca. 80
Break
1 Bechet -- Armstrong -
A0) - -& - p
On the second version of Cake Walking Babies from Home, recorde

the next day by Eva Taylor and Clarence Williams's Blue Five, Arm
strong appears determined to even the score. Like a runner pac
himself at the beginning of a race, Armstrong renders an unassum
ing statement of the melody in the first chorus after the vocal, pla
ing softly in the middle register with simple rhythms. Then at th
beginning of the outchorus he suddenly leaps up an octave and mak
a roaring, rhythmically complex sprint to the finish-playing lead,
the words of Jones and Chilton, "like a demon."48 In fact, there is
uncharacteristically frantic edge to Armstrong's playing that compr
mises its otherwise impressive outward fervor. He clearly seems in
tent on overwhelming Bechet with the sheer force and frenzy of h
playing. In this endeavor he succeeds, for it is hard to pay attentio
to anyone besides Armstrong in this final chorus.
One remarkable thing about this contest is that we hear both per
formances as solos within an ensemble context. Bechet plays his fin
obbligato in take 1 as if it were a solo; Armstrong plays the final lea
in take 2 as if it were a solo. Both players thereby reject the traditio
ensemble roles of their respective instruments in favor of one all-pu
pose solo role.
In the Hot Five recording series of the next few years, Armstron
continued to obscure the division between the functions of solo and
lead. One of the most vivid examples occurs in Put 'Em Down Blues
(1927). The piece begins with an ensemble statement of the forty-eight-
bar pop song's melody, having the form, ABA (16+16+16). Then, af-
ter singing a chorus, Armstrong plays an exceptionally well-crafted
solo. At the end of the B section he takes a four-bar break to usher in
the final A, which apparently was intended to be an outchorus for
the ensemble. But the break ends on a long note in the low register-
hardly a typical lead-in to the normally energetic New Orleans out-
chorus. From this listener's perspective, it does not seem obvious that
his solo is over; perhaps his sidemen felt unsure as well. As Arm-
strong restates the melody, Dodds begins playing his characteristic
running eighth-note obbligatos. Trombonist Kid Ory, however, seems
reluctant to join in. He enters self-consciously and recedes shortly
thereafter. This may have stemmed from confusion over the proper
sequence of the performance. But his hesitancy seems more related
to Armstrong's playing. Dodds and Ory sound out of place here-like
an intrusion on the flow of Armstrong's musical thought. Even Dodds,
who forges ahead, seems to do so out of traditional obligation rather
than musical conviction. Indeed, both Dodds and Ory withdraw af-
ter eight measures so Armstrong can finish the piece alone (except
for a final two-bar ensemble link), confirming the sense of having
momentarily interrupted an Armstrong solo rather than having com-
plemented his lead.49
152 Harker
Dodds apparently d
tional New Orlean
plays almost twice
ens Armstrong an
tions. The functio
is symbolized in th
(1927). Except for a
ning and end of th
ty-two measures b
in a moderately slo
inent soloistic rol
Bechet-like territo
dence on a piece lik
a duel. Yet none of
can be detected her
deir observes, "Cur
far from stimulati
parently cowed by
recognizable attem
recording studio. T
stylistic encroachm
of both Dodds's ow
tive role of his ins
Hot Five has lost m
brass bands during
by dancing high an
became one elemen
recordings, it has b
the clarinet's role h
people no longer co
Armstrong a
In the 1930s and '4
acrobatics of his yo
to continue his assa
the aftermath of b
the new music, cla
the melodic purity
within his cohort o
er man lamenting a
had experimented
elders: "Joe [Oliver
the lead so people
ing a whole lot of f
The young beboppers made the same mistake Armstrong had made;
instead of playing the melody, they "embroider it so much you can
see the design no more."54 Armstrong had two points to make: b
bop wasn't new after all-he had been there first; and from his expe
rience, figurations were a poor substitute for the melody.
Few young musicians paid much attention to Armstrong's admoni
tions. But in 1958 Miles Davis famously declared: "You know you can
play anything on the horn that Louis hasn't played-I mean even mo
ern."55 Davis's comment echoed a more obscure claim made at the
dawn of modern jazz. In 1937 Preston Jackson, a New Orleans trom-
bonist who had witnessed virtually the entire development of jazz in
the North, compared Armstrong and Kid Rena with Roy Eldridge
whose intricate proto-bop solos were just then creating a sensation in
the jazz world. "Roy Eldridge reminds me of Henri (Kid) Rena," Jack-
son wrote. "Rena was playing like Roy fifteen years ago. Roy's style is
very much like Louis' style fifteen years ago. Most all know that Lou-
is played high with a lot of execution as early as 1919 or 1920."56 Jack
son offered Armstrong's Cornet Chop Suey as an example connecting
the two players, urging doubters to "listen to the record and listen to
Roy's records and compare them."57 Indeed, Armstrong's earliest re-
cordings present melodic figures that anticipated bebop. Although not
built on the upper extensions (i.e., ninth, eleventh, thirteenth) of th
harmony, such eighth-note lines as sometimes appear in Weatherbird
Rag and Cornet Chop Suey (bracketed in example 12) might easily have
been played, at faster tempos, by Charlie Parker or Fats Navarro.
Example 12. Proto-bebop lines in Armstrong's melodies on Cornet Chop Suey

and Weatherbird Rag (recorded April 6, 1923).
J= ca. 200
Cornet Chop Suey
I Lr
0, w I r - , I .
- i F FiL-J" " L i~r" F -i'---J
= ca. 208
Weatherbird Rag
h , --
154 Harker
In light of Jackson
dridge also regarde
months before mo
his time practicin
played fast from
wanted to play fast
others did that. Ja
played more sync
was that I played f
like a trumpet play
idiom helps to exp
in 1939: "Roy has,
can play his trump
inet) that one is fo
Other trumpet pla
ration from clarinet
er, used to labor fo
enjoyed practicing
in East St. Louis, co
'cause he played ou
self-added that ev
French book on cla
the clarinet, later a
trumpet technique:
eventually even fas
These scattered ex
fluenced the rise of
to be seen whethe
figures to construc
transfer of idioms
inet music appears
in which Armstron
NOTES
I would like to thank Thomas Brothers, Michael Hicks, Steven Johnson, and Da
son for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article.
1. Quoted in Danny Barker, A Life in Jazz, ed. Alyn Shipton (London: Mac
1986), 59.
2. See, for example, Manfred F. Bukofzer, Music in the Baroque Era (New York: W. W.
Norton, 1947), 15; Friedrich Blume, Renaissance and Baroque Music (New York: W. W.
Norton, 1967), 124; and Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Baroque Music Today: Music as Speech:
Ways to a New Understanding of Music, trans. Mary O'Neill (Portland, Ore.: Amadeus
Press, 1982), 133.
3. In the course of discussing other matters, a handful of scholars have briefly n

ed the influence of the clarinet on Armstrong's music. Lewis Porter seems to have b
the first to do so, in a pioneering essay for the liner notes to Louis Armstrong and
ney Bechet in New York, 1923-1925, the Smithsonian Collection R026 (1981), 2; see
Joshua Berrett, "Louis Armstrong and Opera," Musical Quarterly 76, no. 2 (Sum
1992): 226-27, and Scott DeVeaux, The Birth of Bebop: A Social and Musical History (Berk
ley: University of California Press, 1997), 83. But none of the three major Armstro
biographies of the last twenty years-those by James Lincoln Collier (1983), Gary G
dins (1988), and Laurence Bergreen (1997)-mentions the role of the clarinet, and
ther does the "Louis Armstrong" article by James Dapogny in the 2001 edition of t
New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie (New York: Gro
Dictionaries, 2001).
4. See Berrett, "Louis Armstrong and Opera," and Brian Harker, "The Early Mu
cal Development of Louis Armstrong, 1901-1928," Ph.D. diss., Columbia Univers
New York, 1997, 24-32. Armstrong recalled that "there were many different kinds
people and instruments to inspire me to carry on with my music when I was a boy
always loved music, and it did not matter what the instrument was or who played
so long as the playing was good." Louis Armstrong, Satchmo: My Life in New Orlea
(New York: Prentice-Hall, 1954; reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1986), 111.
5. Bill Russell, New Orleans Style, ed. Barry Martyn and Mike Hazeldine (New O
leans: Jazzology Press, 1994), 138.
6. William J. Schafer, with assistance from Richard B. Allen, Brass Bands and Ne
Orleans Jazz (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1977), 37.
7. Russell, New Orleans Style, 138; Dan Morgenstern, "Yesterday, Today, and Tom
row: An Interview with Louis Armstrong," Down Beat 32, no. 15 (1965): 17.
8. I am indebted to Bruce Raeburn, curator of the William Ransom Hogan Jazz Ar
chive at Tulane University, New Orleans (hereafter Tulane Jazz Archive), for point
out the influence of cornet players from Armstrong's own age group on his mu
development in New Orleans.
9. Max Jones and John Chilton, Louis: The Louis Armstrong Story, 1900-1971 (Lond
1971; reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1988), 18. See also Gunther Schuller, Early Jazz (
York: Oxford University Press, 1968), 72.
10. Preston Jackson made a similar statement: "Rena, Louis, and Buddy Petite [
were the coming cornetists when Joe [Oliver] was in his prime." Louis Armstrong
tical file, Tulane Jazz Archive.
11. Punch Miller, interview, April 4, 1960, Tulane Jazz Archive (hereafter Miller
terview).
12. Russell, New Orleans Style, 84. By all accounts, Kelly exemplified the old school
of playing more associated with his age group. Nat Shapiro and Nat Hentoff, Hear Me
Talkin' to Ya (New York: Rinehart, 1955; reprint, New York: Dover, 1966), 50. Perhaps
the displays of fast fingering during bucking contests discouraged him from partici-
pating beside Rena.
13. Preston Jackson, "Les Louisianians," Jazz-hot 1 (March 1935): 11.
14. The identity and meaning of Creole ethnicity in New Orleans jazz is still poorly
understood. Like other musicians such as Jelly Roll Morton and Sidney Bechet, Kid Rena
may have laid claim to a Creole lineage without possessing all the generally accepted
Creole characteristics: French language, Catholic religion, European cultural "refine-
ment," and middle- to upper-class economic status. For an introduction to ethnic and
class divisions in New Orleans music, see Alan Lomax, Mister Jelly Roll: The Fortunes of
Jelly Roll Morton, New Orleans Creole and "Inventor of Jazz," 2d ed. (Berkeley: University
of California Press, 1973), 49-109, and Burton Peretti, The Creation of Jazz: Music, Race,
and Culture in Urban America (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1992), 22-38.
156 Harker
15. Kay C. Thompson, "

(July-Aug. 1950): 43.
16. Interview with Pete
17. Thompson, "Louis
18. Russell, New Orlean
19. Miller interview, A
where in this article sho
sage of time, faulty me
er-known figures at A
statements by Miller an
at least, when confront
20. Miller interview, Se
21. Bruce Raeburn, wh
chive at Tulane, told m
that many were talkin
from the relative statures of the two later in life.
22. Sidney Bechet, Treat It Gentle (New York: Hill and Wang, 1960; reprint, New York:
Da Capo, 1978), 92-93.
23. I am referring here to lead cornet parts in the ensemble, not solo parts. The solo
cornet tradition, exemplified by such virtuosos as Herbert L. Clarke, cornet soloist for
John Philip Sousa, emphasized at least as much figuration as a typical woodwind ob-
bligato.
24. Armstrong, Satchmo, 134. For more on Bechet's surprisingly strong cornet skills,
see John Chilton, Sidney Bechet: The Wizard of Jazz (London: Macmillan, 1987), 11, 18. I
am indebted to Thomas Brothers for pointing out that, according to the original type-
script of Satchmo, Armstrong indeed meant "cornet" and not "clarinet" in the above
quotation.
25. Armstrong, Satchmo, 134-35; Morgenstern, "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow,"
18.
26. Richard Meryman, "An Authentic American Genius: An Interview with Louis
Armstrong," Life, April 15, 1966, 108.
27. This probably means that even at this early date Armstrong was transcribing (i.e.,
learning recorded solos by ear), though almost certainly not notating on paper what
he heard. Transcription, an informal self-teaching method practiced by many later
would-be jazz musicians, would have been virtually without precedent in 1917-the
dawn of jazz recording.
28. Joe Rena, interview, April 7, 1960, Tulane Jazz Archive (hereafter Rena interview).
29. Miller interview, April 4, 1960.
30. Rena interview. Apparently others in the group followed Rena's example, too.
Miller said that he, Armstrong, and the others used to file their mouthpieces until they
found out about a brass technician in Chicago who would make adjustable mouth-
pieces with screw-on rims: one deep and one shallow. Miller interview, April 4, 1960.
31. Mike Pinfold, Louis Armstrong (New York: Universe Books, 1987), 29.
32. Quoted in Berrett, "Louis Armstrong and Opera," 226-27.
33. Morgenstern, "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow," 17.
34. Russell, New Orleans Style, 213. In 1918 Durante formed the Original New Or-
leans Jazz Band in New York, which included Frank Christian (cornet), Achille Bac-
quet (clarinet), Frank L'Hotak (trombone), and Johnny Stein (drums). The name of the
band was changed to Jimmy Durante's Jazz Band in 1920.
35. Lorenzo Tio Jr., the leading New Orleans clarinetist of the 1910s, favored arpeg-
giated lines in his obbligato accompaniments and breaks. Recordings with the Armand
J. Piron Orchestra in 1923 "show Lorenzo Tio, Jr., to be an accomplished clarinetist with
ample technique to play fast-moving arpeggiated lines in every register." Charle

Kinzer, "The Tio Family: Four Generations of New Orleans Musicians, 1814-1933
Ph.D. diss., Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, 1993, 275-80, quote on 275.
cordings of Tio's younger colleagues Sidney Bechet and Johnny Dodds reveal the sa
preoccupation.
36. Hughes Panassie, Louis Armstrong (New York: Scribner's, 1971; reprint, New Yo
Da Capo, 1980), 59-60; James Lincoln Collier, Louis Armstrong: An American Genius (
York: Oxford University Press), 104.
37. David Chevan, "Written Music in Early Jazz," Ph.D. diss., City University of N
York, 274.
38. In the late 1920s Jabbo Smith made some of the first recordings to rival Arm
strong in technical virtuosity, including some that display a formidable command
arpeggiated lines.
39. Lillian Hardin Armstrong, Satchmo and Me, Riverside 12-120, LP recording.
40. Frederick Ramsey Jr. and Charles Edward Smith, eds., Jazzmen (New York: H
court Brace, 1939; reprint, New York: Limelight, 1985), 126.
41. Hardin Armstrong, Satchmo and Me.
42. Shapiro and Hentoff, Hear Me Talkin' to Ya, 102.
43. This meaning is suggested by the following quotations, among many others. Cl
inetist Barney Bigard said that Lorenzo Tio Jr. "was a great reader even by today's st
dards. He had real fast execution and he could improvise ... on top of all the re
Quoted in Kinzer, "The Tio Family," 329. Pianist Earl Hines remembered Dizzy Gille
as "one of the fastest guys as far as execution on his horn." Quoted in DeVeaux,
Birth of Bebop, 254.
44. Compare this with the clear distinction between Armstrong's and Dodds's l
in My Heart. In keeping with traditional New Orleans practice, Armstrong plays sho
repeated melodic fragments while Dodds carries on a long, variegated line of eig
notes.
45. Brian Harker, "'Telling a Story': Louis Armstrong and Coherence in Early Ja
Current Musicology (1999): 58-66. For the Magee text cited below, see Jeffrey Stan
Magee, "The Music of Fletcher Henderson and His Orchestra in the 1920s," (Ph.D.
University of Michigan, 1992), 316.
46. Schuller, Early Jazz, 195.
47. As Collier notes, Bechet is too close to the recording source here, but this o
enhances the advantage he already has. Louis Armstrong, 142.
48. Jones and Chilton, Louis, 105.
49. Compare Andre Hodeir's discussion of the relationship among the three h
players on an earlier Hot Five recording, You Made Me Love You: "in the fourth
rus,.... Louis
beautiful plays the
paraphrase first
begun halffirst
in the as a sixteen
solo and thecontinues
bars second half
withwith the othe
relentless log
the following sixteen, in spite of the clarinet's and trombone's intrusion, whic
ther helps nor hinders because Louis's part is too fascinating for the others to at
any attention." Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence, trans. David Noakes (New York: Gr
Press, 1956), 55.
50. Ibid., 60.
51. Ibid., 51.
52. For more on Armstrong's role in this debate, see Joshua Berrett, ed., The L
Armstrong Companion: Eight Decades of Commentary (New York: Schirmer Books,
139-57.
53. Meryman, "An Authentic American Genius," 104.

54. Robert Walser, Keeping Time: Readings in Jazz History (New York: Oxford Univer-
sity Press, 1999), 155.
158 Harker
55. Gary Carner, The M

Schirmer Books, 1996), 9
56. Preston Jackson, "S
meaning of "execution,
57. Ibid.
58. Valerie Wilmer, "Why Speed King Roy Slowed Down," Melody Maker (Nov. 8,
1975): 49. Italics added.
59. Max Jones, "Eldridge Blowing, Not Fighting," Melody Maker (June 4, 1977): 55.
Eldridge may have borrowed even more heavily from saxophone than from clarinet
style. As a young player he learned tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins's 1926 Stam-
pede solo note for note. Eldridge claimed that in his early career, "I was playing fine
saxophone on the trumpet." Nat Hentoff, "Roy Eldridge," in The Jazz Makers, ed. Nat
Shapiro and Nat Hentoff (New York: Rinehart and Company, 1957), 301.
60. Hughes Panassie, "Impressions of America," Jazz-Hot, 5, no. 30 (1939): 9.
61. Stanley Dance, The World of Duke Ellington (New York: Scribner's Sons, 1970; re-
print, New York: Da Capo, 1981), 186. In an interview from 1995 Terry said, "I used to
practice out of clarinet books, and I used to love to listen to Lester Young.... So Lest-
er Young, practicing out of clarinet books and working on fast passages may have had
something to do with my persistence in trying to master whatever the heck it was I
was trying to master." Bob Blumenthal, "Clark Terry: Reflections on a Brilliant Career,"
JazzTimes (October 1995): 32.
62. Jack Chambers, Milestones: The Music and Times of Miles Davis (New York: Wil-
liam Morrow, 1989), 15.
63. DeVeaux, Birth of Bebop, 195-96.

Louis Armstrong and The Clarinet

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Louis Armstrong and The Clarinet

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Louis Armstrong and the Clarinet

Author(s): Brian Harker

Confronted with Louis Armstrong's rising celebrity in the 1920s, Kid

Brian Harker is assistant professor of music at Brigham Young University,

New Orleans Rivalries

Although as a teenager Armstrong loved playing the cornet, he seems

Example 1. High Society, clarinet obbligato as played by Johnny Dodds w

...... rji 'F - - ,

inet Marmalade, originally played by Larry Shields (ex. 2).

I IV I I L t L I Ivt t p / / ._1 i" I I - I

ton, these generalizations hold true. But in the trio from C

I was gone .. clarinet things; nothing but figurations and thing

Armstrong continued pressing the conventional boundaries of the

Example 3. Chimes Blues, Armstrong's solo, first half (April 6, 1923).

Example 5. Sawtooth arpeggios in the breaks of Lorenzo Tio Jr., John

b. Johnny Dodds, Buddy's Habit (Oct. 5/15, 1923).

c. Armstrong, Tears (Oct. 5/15, 1923).

e. Armstrong, Shanghai Shuffle, take 2 (Nov. 7,

Example 6. Harmonized cornet in

Naughty Man, take 1

Naughty Man, take 2

6 . . , . . f"l " , . "

"t 2 R I.. . -a PE " - - 1-.4 iF

Though commonplace on the clarinet, such lines must have astound-

It was just as well, of course, for Armstrong's arpeggios had at lea

Example 8. On Don't Shake It No More (1925), Tommy Ladnier borrows Ar

Arpeggios did not exhaust the clarinet idiom. Armstrong sometim

iver's immediately subsequent statement of the lead, with its consc

Armstrong's experimentation with clarinet style blurred the bound-

sion Armstrong eve

On the second version of Cake Walking Babies from Home, recorde

Example 12. Proto-bebop lines in Armstrong's melodies on Cornet Chop Suey

3. In the course of discussing other matters, a handful of scholars have briefly n

15. Kay C. Thompson, "

ample technique to play fast-moving arpeggiated lines in every register." Charle

53. Meryman, "An Authentic American Genius," 104.

55. Gary Carner, The M

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