Louis armstrong biography youtube leonardo dicaprio

Chet Baker: comeback and fadeout

It’s 25 years today since Chet Baker was found dead on an Amsterdam pavement, apparently having fallen from the window of his hotel room. Police concluded that his death had been caused by head injuries consistent with a fall from 30ft or so; the reason has never been definitively established. The original assumption of suicide was undermined by the discovery that the window of his third-floor room in the Hotel Prins Hendrik would open no more than 15 or 20 inches: not impossible to squeeze through, but awkward. Traces of heroin and cocaine were found in the room, along with his trumpet. In the long and tragic history of the deaths of jazz musicians from non-natural causes, this was perhaps the least unexpected. The only surprise was that Baker, a junkie on and off since the mid-Fifties, had survived beyond his 58th birthday. The general belief now seems to be that he was murdered after a drug deal went wrong.

It would not have been the first time. When I met him 40 years ago this summer, he was just beginning the long comeback from an incident in San Francisco in which he was beaten so badly that he needed his upper teeth replacing with dentures. He gave me a version of his story about an angry drug dealer setting five thugs on him, and about the subsequent retreat to his mother’s home in San Jose, where he and his family lived on welfare payments and food stamps for several years until he finally decided to give music another go.

Now it was July 1973 and, thanks to the kindness of Dizzy Gillespie, who put in a good word for him, he had secured a couple of weeks at the Half Note club in Manhattan. The club’s owners, the Canterino family, had just moved it from the original location in SoHo to the corner of West 54th Street and Sixth Avenue in midtown. It was perhaps ironic that Gillespie should have done him such a favour: he was one of those bebop pioneers who had suffered 20 years earlier

Louis Armstrong’s Black and Blues is as much about race as it is music; Christian Bale says Leonardo DiCaprio gets offered every role before him; The trailer is out for Lindsay Lohan’s new Netflix movie Falling For Christmas. All in today’s Movie News Rundown.

But First: Our own Tim Molloy is in vibrant Indianapolis this week covering the Heartland International Film Festival.

On Satchmo: Sacha Jenkins, the director of the new documentary Louis Armstrong’s Black & Blues, is also the co-creator of a short-lived but brilliant magazine in the 1990s called ego trip. Just like he did back then disguising a magazine about race as a magazine about hip-hop, Jenkins is doing something similar with his Louis Armstrong documentary, which just made its Midwestern premiere at Thursday’s opening night of the Heartland International Film Festival. As much as Louis Armstrong’s Black & Blues is about music, it’s also about race and how Louis Armstrong was a quiet revolutionary. Read Tim’s full story here.

Bale vs. DiCaprio: Christian Bale said in his new GQ cover story that Leonardo DiCaprio has been offered just about every role Bale has ever gotten first. But Bale isn’t sour: “Oh, dude. It’s not just me. Look, to this day, any role that anybody gets, it’s only because he’s passed on it beforehand,” Bale said in response to a question about having lost several roles to Leonardo DiCaprio in the ’90s, including Jack in Titanic. Leo was also originally meant to play Patrick Bateman in American Psycho before Bale took over. The list of iconic roles from other actors’ careers that were initially offered to Leonardo DiCaprio is staggering. Read our full story here.

We Knew Dahmer Had… Weird Taste: But did he really watch The Exorcist III every day like it’s portrayed in Ryan Murphy’s Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story? Our own Tim Molloy did some digging, and the answer is n

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Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901 - July 6, 1971) was an American trumpeter and vocalist also known as "Satchmo," "Satch," and "Pops." He is one of jazz's most influential figures. His career has spanned five decades and several eras in jazz history.

Armstrong was born in New Orleans and raised there. Armstrong, who rose to prominence in the 1920s as an inventive trumpet and cornet player, was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the emphasis of the music away from collective improvisation and toward solo performance. Around 1922, he moved to Chicago with his mentor, Joe "King" Oliver, to play in the Creole Jazz Band. In Chicago, he spent time with other well-known jazz musicians, including a reunion with his friend Bix Beiderbecke and visits with Hoagy Carmichael and Lil Hardin.

He made a name for himself in "cutting contests," and his fame reached bandleader Fletcher Henderson. Henderson convinced Armstrong to relocate to New York City, where he rose to prominence as a featured and musically influential band soloist and recording artist. Hardin married Armstrong's second wife, and the two returned to Chicago to play together before he started his own "Hot" jazz band. After years of touring, he settled in Queens, and by the 1950s, he had become a national musical icon, thanks in part to his appearances on radio, film, and television, as well as his concerts.

Armstrong was an influential singer and skilled improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song with his instantly recognizable rich, gravelly voice. He could also do scat singing. Armstrong is well-known for his charismatic stage presence, voice, and trumpet playing. Armstrong's influence had spread to popular music in general by the end of his life. Armstrong was one of the first well-known African-American entertainers to "cross over" to a large following among white (and international) audiences. To the chagrin of fellow African Americans, h

Tracy Morgan’s next role could show off a different side of his acting. As confirmed by Coming 2 America co-star Jermaine Fowler, Morgan plans to portray late jazz great Louis Armstrong in a self-financed biopic.

Fowler shared the revelation in an interview with NME after being asked whether he thinks Morgan’s acting chops are underrated. “I do. I would love to see him do something dramatic,” Fowler said. “In fact, he showed us a clip of a movie he’s financing that’s really, really dope. He wants to play Louis Armstrong in a biopic and I believe he can do it.”

He continued by saying Morgan sounds and looks exactly like Armstrong in the clip. “If he can truly pull that off I think it’ll put Tracy on another level altogether,” Fowler added.

Taraji P. Henson also confirmed Morgan’s ability to play Armstrong when they both guested on Conan in 2019, saying she was “blown away” by a preview of the biopic.

“Our lives run parallel. I really believe this is a beautiful world,” Morgan told Conan O’Brien, while referencing Armstrong’s signature song, “What a Wonderful World”. “With all the scams and drudgery and broken dreams, it’s still a beautiful place to be.”

Morgan plays Fowler’s uncle in the new Coming to America sequel. Best known for his run on Saturday Night Live and scene-stealing role on the NBC sitcom, 30 Rock, the comedian first spoke to Howard Stern about developing the Armstrong biopic in 2018.

At the time, he told Stern that the script was being written by comic Jeff Stilson, who wrote on The Late Show with David Letterman and formerly wrote and produced on The Daily Show. If that information still holds true, the biopic might not be an entirely serious effort.

Morgan called Armstrong his dream role in a 2016 interview with The San Diego Tribune. “If I had my dre