Louis Armstrong's America, Vol. 1

Neither of author, composer, and saxophonist Allen Lowes two-volume, four-disc Louis Armstrongs America sets contains compositions by their storied subject or tunes associated with him. Given the massive scope of Lowes earlier work, this shouldnt come as a surprise. This ambitious undertaking contains 69 tracks composed by Lowe as an expression of an "older American musical aesthetic, sensibility and cultural consciousness…" As a whole, it reflects Armstrong being influenced by, and later influencing, American popular music, as seen through the lens of his life and Black cultural experience. Lowe argues that Armstrong was the first post-modernist, picking from a wide variety of musical sources (minstrel show, pop, opera, and blues, and later, the Beatles and James Brown, Ornette Coleman and Captain Beefheart) without regard for cultural, class, or racial hierarchies. Lowes tunes namecheck historic periods and persons from swing and ragtime through bop, modal music, and more. In his copious liner notes and track annotations, he namechecks Duke Ellington, Bo Diddley, Utah Smith, Steve Albini, Ben Harney, and others, as well as monumental historical events, including the Little Rock Nine and the appearance of Black composer William Grant Still at Carnegie Hall. Lowe uses various groups of players to accomplish this including trombonist Ray Anderson, trumpeter Frank Lacy, pianists Lewis Porter, Matthew Shipp, and Ursula Oppens, guitarists Ray Suhy and Marc Ribot, drummers Ethan Kogan and Kresten Osgood, bassist Will Goble, and various others. LAA, Vol. 1s opening cut, "Mr. Jenkins Lonely Orphans Band" (titled after the youth orchestra that gave us Jabbo Smith, Freddie Green, and Cat Anderson) easily gives way to "Aaron Copeland Has the Blues," a languid tune that resembles a back porch lullaby with the bassist playing a 12-bar line. On "Calling All Freaks (an homage to Armstrongs musical director Luis Russell), weds 1920s swing and jump blues to a 21st century banjo solo by Suhy. "One Two Fuck You: Steve Albini Ascends to Heaven" is an angry homage to punk from the Seeds and Ramones to Big Black. "I Should Have Stayed Dead (ballad)" is a mutant lounge-blues duet between Lowes sax and Shipps piano. Disc twos "When Dave Schildkraut Goes Marching In" is titled after an obscure yet highly regarded sax player and based on a live rendition of the NOLA standard "Saints"; the song traverses gospel, swing, and bebop. "Back Home Rag" is modeled on bandleader James Reese Europe, who led the first recorded jazz orchestra in 1913. "Roswells Dream" is a loving tribute to trombonist Roswell Rudd, one of Lowes best friends and musical collaborators. "Pleased," a horn-driven jam, translates the jazz-blues through the early work of James Brown. More than two-and-a-half-hours long, this set is astonishing. Its compositions, groupings, and collisions of styles and genres dont sound remotely anachronistic filtered as they are through Lowes sheer musical skill and kaleidoscopic approach to jazz. ~ Thom Jurek