Louis Armstrong and the Clarinet

By Brian Harker

Confronted with Louis Armstrong's rising celebrity in the 1920s, Kid Rena, an old rival from New Orleans, reacted with jealous resentment: "And because Louis [is] up North making records and running up and down like he's crazy don't mean he's that great. He is not playing cornet on that horn; he is imitating a clarinet." For music historians the last part of this statement has a familiar ring, calling to mind the transfer of idioms in baroque music, in which, for example, the violin imitates the voice or the harpsichord appropriates lute-based style brisé or violinistic figuration. Jazz writers routinely acknowledge the influence of leading soloists—especially Armstrong and Charlie Parker—on players of other instruments. But the transfer of instrumental as opposed to personal idioms has received less attention. For instance, even though for at least twenty years scholars have noted Armstrong's fascination with the clarinet, most writers continue to view his unorthodox early style as the simple product of genius. To be sure, the clarinet was not the only outside influence; scholars have connected Armstrong with sources as disparate as Italian opera and New Orleans drummers. If we overlook the role of the clarinet, however, we will misunderstand a fundamental aspect of Armstrong's early musical development. For all his bitterness, Kid Rena knew what he was talking about. It was Rena, after all, who saw the interest in clarinet style take root in the first place, as he and Armstrong competed for musical supremacy while growing up on the streets of New Orleans.