Terry Teachout (1956–2022)

As a newly-minted, 20 year old jazz fan, I didn't give much thought to Louis Armstrong. Knew him then as the smiling singer of popular tunes, not much like the Coltrane/Davis/Sanders groups I was discovering. But then there was that famous four-word summary of the history of jazz from Miles Davis: "Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker." I understood about Parker, but why Armstrong? He had disparaged Parker and the other beboppers, younger musicians who played edgier music and didn't care about pleasing their white listeners. I later discovered Armstrong's Hot Fives and Hot Sevens from the 1920s; OK, he'd been one of the inventors of jazz. Over the years, I heard more Armstrong recordings, and gained new appreciation for ones I already knew.

Armstrong (1901-1971) was born in deep poverty, deprived of even knowing his birth date, which was about a year later than the July 4, 1900 he claimed. He supported himself with his music from age 17, spending most of his life on the road. Beyond helping to invent jazz, he gave us some of the most sublime versions of Great American Songbook tunes - "Blueberry Hill", "Mack the Knife", "What a Wonderful World" - singing in his gravelly voice, proving that art needn't be pretty to be beautiful.

Teachout looks to reclaim the long middle part of Armstrong's career, normally associated with mediocre backup bands, especially in the 1930s. He notes some fine work in the period, but I'm not sure he makes the case. Armstrong had to live with the presence of gangsters in the music business, and seems to have accepted the protection of one in particular, his longtime manager Joe Glaser, at the cost of half of his earnings. Maybe Armstrong thought such a disadvantageous deal was his best prospect, as a Black man in America, for getting on with his music and a secure living.

As usual in a biography, I discovered endless facts I hadn't known. Armstrong was self-taught on the cornet and trumpet, and his technique caused steady harm to his embouchure. He had the first star billing for a Black performer in a Hollywood movie, and at one point in 1941 was associated with an Orson Welles project to make a movie about jazz. He and Bing Crosby were friends. The book includes 54 pages of notes with lots of bits like these. Teachout drew on much previously unavailable material for this book, including many hours of candid recordings Armstrong made of himself.

Besides wanting to know more about Armstrong, I read this book for insight into the late Terry Teachout (1956-2022). I followed Teachout's twitter account for several years, and found him an interesting and humane writer on the arts. But he was a political conservative, working for National Review and organizing "The Vile Body, a social club of right-wing intellectuals from the fields of publishing and journalism in New York City." Considering the general barbarity of right wing discourse in the US today, I wondered how Teachout could exist as an exception. I still don't understand it, except that we all compartmentalize.

There's a conservative aspect of his subject that must have appealed. Armstrong was abandoned by his father at birth, and later wrote of his contempt for those of his race who shirked their responsibilities. Still, Teachout does not downplay Armstrong's own recognition of racism: "Why, do you know I played ninety-nine million hotels I couldn't stay at? And if I had friends blowing at some all-white nightclub or hotel I couldn't get in to see 'em - or them to see me."

This is from one of the finest musicians America has produced. Armstrong's life is as inspiring a testament to overcoming odds as we could ask for.… (more)

The late Terry Teachout's Pops is widely regarded as the best biography of Louis Armstrong, surpassing its nearest competitor, Louis Armstrong: American Genius by James Lincoln Collier. The book uses original interviews and recently archived material to follow Armstrong's life and career, dispelling myths and providing entertaining sidelights along the way. His musical output (both on record and in live performance) is rigorously examined, and the nostrums about his dwindling importance after the 1920s are duly questioned. Teachout is a fine writer; his opinions are well-considered and difficult to refute. Sometimes his approach can be overly attacking, even when justified (John Hammond and Gunther Schuller, for example, are savaged for their dismissal of Armstrong's later work). The book's perspective is understandably quite American, and Teachout is one of the many US critics who don't hold with the idea that jazz musicians met with a more favourable audience in Europe. While Teachout is not afraid to find fault with Armstrong where there is fault to find, this is clearly the work of someone who relishes Armstrong's genius – a factor that makes Pops all the more rewarding. Highly recommended.… (more)