Louis Armstrong: Master of Modernism by Thomas Brothers (review)

Abstract

JAZZ AND BANDS Louis Armstrong: Master of Modernism. By Thomas Brothers. New York: W. W. Norton, 2014. [xi, 594 p. ISBN 9780393065824 (hardcover), $39.95; ISBN 9780393350807 (paperback), $19.95.] Music examples, illustrations, discography, bibliography, index.A continuation of Brothers's Louis Armstrong's New Orleans (New York: W. W. Norton, 2006), book focuses on ten years of Louis Armstrong's life and music from 1922. Brothers divides decade into Armstrong's two styles: first, around years 1926-28 which was typified his Hot Five and Hot Seven recordings, and second, the result of efforts to succeed in mainstream market of white audiences (p. 9). Although Brothers does not define term modern, underlying Armstrong's modern is notion that he created modern black identity (p. 196) internalizing and then transforming the AfricanAmerican musical vernacular (p. 3), which is described as the orally based traditions that were formed on slave plantations of Deep South and continued to provide everyday basis for cultural expression among lower-class blacks (p. 4).Brothers's basic contentions are themselves indisputable: for example, that Armstrong's music is inherently African American in nature and that he was deeply indebted to his musical background in New Orleans; however, his assertion that nearly all aspects of Armstrong's music are direct manifestations of African legacies is problematic. For example, he argues that fixed and variable model, as underlying principle of Armstrong's first modern style, is musical model that is still ubiquitous in sub-Saharan Africa, from which enslaved people brought it to New World (p. 6). Focusing on rhythmic aspect of West African percussion music, Brothers explains that on fixed level one instrument (or group of instruments) plays a repeated rhythmic figure, while the 'variable' instrument or group brings music to life departing from repeated figure in interesting ways (ibid.). Arguing that Armstrong applied model to and harmony as well as (ibid.), Brothers broadens it to include any variable musical element superimposed on any underlying musical structure at all levels, encompassing displacements of rhythm, harmony, melody, phrasing, timbre, and form, with specific examples of syncopation, substitute harmony, harmonic anticipation, extended harmony, and nonharmonic tones.This overarching model might be a result of an attempt to overcompensate for loss of a direct African legacy, because while acknowledging that details of West African drum ensembles did not survive in American South, Brothers claims that the fixed and variable model not only survived, it flourished (p. 94), as the general principles were retained and applied to different instruments, techniques, repertories, and styles (p. 93). In fact, he ironically argues that by making fixed and variable model so central to his music, Armstrong intensified audible presence of his African heritage (pp. 6-7; italics in original) and that this African legacy was strengthened (p. 196). This is a problematic model not only because it is too broad to be meaningful, but also because Brothers does not provide any supporting evidence, and because his understanding of African music simplistically equates it with West African percussion music while ignoring extraordinary musical diversity in West African region alone. Ironically, Brothers claims that a prejudice in jazz history that emphasizes rhythm rather than melody has failed to recognize Armstrong as a great melodist (p. 457), while he himself employs a similar approach to African music. Another self-contradictory example is his emphasis on improvisation as an integrally African musical practice, while repeatedly stressing that Armstrong's solos and New Orleans jazz in general were not improvised, but rather worked out over time. …