Louis Armstrong and the Rise of Jazz

FAIN: FA-52011-05

Brian Cameron Harker
Brigham Young University (Provo, UT 84602)

Trumpeter and singer Louis Armstrong (1901-1971) made several vital contributions to jazz in its infancy, including virtuosic technical facility, rhythmic swing, rhetorical coherence, extended range, and scat singing, among others. In 1997 I completed my doctoral dissertation, "The Early Musical Development of Louis Armstrong, 1901-1928," which explored these contributions in detail. I would now like to expand upon these findings by doing further research at libraries and archives in the New York City area. The results of my studies will come together in a book, LOUIS ARMSTRONG AND THE RISE OF JAZZ. The University of California Press has expressed interest in publishing it, pending a successful review process of my formal proposal.

Associated Products

Louis Armstrong, Eccentric Dance, and the Evolution of Jazz on the Eve of Swing (Article)
Title: Louis Armstrong, Eccentric Dance, and the Evolution of Jazz on the Eve of Swing
Author: Brian Harker
Abstract: From the summer of 1926 to the summer of 1927 Louis Armstrong collaborated with a husband-and-wife dance team called Brown and McGraw. Closely matching the rhythms of their tap dancing steps, Armstrong seems to have been inspired to explore new rhythmic patterns in his solos from this period. Their collaboration reveals one of many intersections between jazz music and dance in the years leading up to the swing era.
Year: 2008
Primary URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/jams.2008.61.1.67?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Primary URL Description: JSTOR link to the journal
Access Model: subscription only
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: Journal of the American Musicological Society
Publisher: University of California Press

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