Armstrong's collages reveal a lesser-known side of the jazz great

Louis Armstrong, godfather of jazz, found his voice on stage through the trumpet and his trademark vocalizing. But unbeknownst to many jazz fans, Armstrong (nicknamed Pops and Satchel Mouth—Satchmo) had another creative mouthpiece: collages. Armstrong’s collages cover the boxes of some 500 of the 650 reel-to-reel tapes in his home collection.

This side of Louis Armstrong’s art is on display through Sept. 26 in the exhibit, “The Collage Aesthetic of Louis Armstrong: In the Cause of Happiness.” The collages can be seen in a narrow gallery in Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Jazz at Lincoln Center, called the Peter Jay Sharpe Arcade. The exhibition comes shortly after the publication of “Satchmo: The Wonderful World and Art of Louis Armstrong” by Steven Brower, which features the entire collection of Armstrong’s collages.

The show features high-resolution copies of the original tape boxes that were on display at the Louis Armstrong House Museum in Queens this past July. Assembled by Columbia professors Robert O’Meally and C. Daniel Dawson on the basis of visual and storytelling appeal, the ephemera are presented by Jazz at Lincoln Center as works of art in themselves.

Though the captions accompanying the pieces tend to dwell on visual aesthetics, O’Meally sees the artist behind the collages as the same Louis Armstrong heard in audio recordings. “What I was hoping is that even the most hardcore music fan would say: ‘Wait a minute. Is there some sense in which he is collaging the music?’” O’Meally said. It was in the spirit of Armstrong to match blues, opera, and pop music across a 64 bar solo (the exhibit includes a video of a 1933 rendition of “Dinah” in which he does just that).

Armstrong didn’t grow up listening to jazz records—he was on the first jazz records with King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band in 1923. Instead, he was a fan of American tenor voice John McCormack, whom he listened to, as he put it, “for the phrasing.” At the exhibit, visitors can listen to unreleased footage from an audiotape he made at home, on which he’ll tell you again: “People gotta listen to all kinds of music.”

If you’re greeting the display with ears untouched by Armstrong, I suggest you head to the source—the music, of course—before you go. The exhibit is flanked by a Jazz Hall of Fame replete with touchscreen audio and bios of 25 of the greats, so your visit is sure to be accompanied, and maybe confused, by the sounds of Ornette Coleman, Charles Mingus, and other luminaries.

If you can’t make it to Jazz at Lincoln Center in time, the Louis Armstrong House Museum, just an hour or so away from campus, is open year-round. Columbia, of course, is also just steps away from all kinds of jazz history, from Minton’s Playhouse at 119th Street to the Village Vanguard downtown, just off the 1 train. But what better place to start your jazz education than with the man who was not only the originator of swing, but granddaddy of all American popular music?

As renowned jazz historian and WKCR DJ Phil Schaap, CC ’73, explained, “If you’re talking virtuosity on the trumpet, Louie’s your guy, but he also founded a new school of music—of which he was the best—and the vocal influence ... Bing Crosby to Billie Holiday on the pop side, Chuck Berry to Mick Jagger to Michael Jackson, if you wanted to go there. There would be no Elvis without Louie Armstrong. This kind of dominance is unknown to the rest of music.”

But the bottom line, according to Schaap, is simple. “Everyone listened to Pops. If you know that, then you don’t need a list.”