Louis Armstrong is an artist born in the year 1901 in New Orleans. His early years were spent with spent with his mother before he started playing cornet at a place called Colored Waif’s Home in one of the bands that were building up at the time. He continued to develop his interests, joining yet another band by the name Creole Jazz in the year 1922. Since then, Armstrong emerged to be an international icon not only in the music industry but in the social aspects that concern the world as well (Scott 142).
Influence in Music and Comparison of Hit Songs
This artist’s first solo was recorded at the Chimes Blues in the year 1923. At this time Armstrong operated in a band, but as time moved by it was evident that he wanted to pursue and build on his own career. This was a major step because the successive turn out of events would be associated to him and not the group that composed of the band. In turn had influenced many artists of the time to go single in their music careers and consequently earn for themselves when their songs hit the masses. It was evident that with the influence his actions posed to the rest of the artists in the music industry that he was in a bid to develop his personal career in his own way and in no collaboration (Colin 3169)
His hit songs can be compared based on different aspects. In the year 1924, Armstrong’s publicity was growing by a greater margin. Becoming one of the best cornet players directed public attention to him. This was amid being recognized as one of the strongest soloists of his time at a time when other bands were experiencing his influence in almost every musical aspect, thereby resulting to the emergence of hot jazz in the city of New York. Further freelance performances that he engaged in raised the music industry and the public eye on him. He moved the music industry by using his own recordings in the improvement of his personal stature. These recordings included reel-to-reel recordings.
His playing and singing of scat popularized Armstrong. The “Heebie Jeebies” was one of these kinds of performances. This built up his vocal identity that was in no time adopted by other performing artists. His “I done forgot the words” was also an evidence of Armstrong’s success in the scat singing that characterized his hit performances. This artist could interchange vocals, use short and long phrases, improvise and further use his voice just like his own made trumpet (Scott 167). All these were characteristic of his musical wave that overhauled the industry at his time.
Further comparison of Armstrong’s hit songs dates back from the time “Stardust” was released to the time he did “All the time in the world”. Many songs came between these periods, and so is the comparison intertwined to the flow of events during this time. His popularity had described what success in the music career is all about. Some of his songs featured on several commercial advertisements including the Guinness advert. This relationship signified the fact that music could be made to appear and portray the characteristics of creativity and therefore achieve desired results interrelated by the virtue of what the public perceived it to be. Other songs like “What a wonderful world” hit the entire globe and more especially the British charts. Any comparison of the hit songs done by Armstrong revolves around the concept of his success in the music industry and his personal affiliated influence to the worldwide direction that his kind of music took, prior to his contribution (Colin 3984).
Works Cited
Colin, Larkin. The Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music: Volume 6 of the Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music; Original from the University of California. California: Guinness Publications. 4991 pages
Scott, Allen. Louis Armstrong: the life, music, and screen career. New Orleans: McFarland. 2004. 231 pages
