I Cover the Waterfront

I had already listened my way through the phenomenal Hot 5 and 7 recordings from the 1920s and fallen in love with Nat Hentoff's selections from the supposedly inferior big band recordings of the 1930s. In fact I had collected nearly all of the pre-All Stars recordings, had listened to a good number of those later recordings, as well, and had steeped myself in Satch Plays Fats. But I did not fully understand Louis Armstrong's genius until I saw this clip on TV several years ago---I believe on the Ken Burns Jazz series.

The trumpet licks are---for Armstrong---throwaways. But the vocal performance is mind blowing. I tried to explain something about this experience of Armstrong, in passing, a couple of years ago. I said then that Ellison caught it in words: "vanilla ice cream and sloe gin. . . . red liquid over the white mound, watching it glisten and the vapor rising."

Fortunately for all of us, we also have the thing itself. We have this document from 1933.

Alternative version: There are several uploads of this video clip on YouTube. This other one has fuzzier picture and poorer sound, but the video and audio seemed a little more in sync to me.