Lazy Woman’s Blues
LP Collectors Classic CC 32
I used to transcribe what Louis Armstrong played and then go to our rehearsal place a few houses down the street and practice it. There is a lot to learn from those tracks; Armstrong’s choice of notes, his double tempo phrases, the timing, the intonation and so on. And of course, you can also do like I do now, just sit in front of your speakers and enjoy it all.
While in New York with Fletcher Henderson the young Louis Armstrong became employed as a studio musician to accompany singers and now back in Chicago he continued such activities. The singers, though, were not always in the same high class as for example Bessie and Clara Smith that he worked with in New York.
The timeline is interesting since this is recorded on November 9, 1925, only three days before Louis would get his name on a record label by starting his masterpiece series with his Hot Five.
Blanche Calloway is certainly not the best singer on the LP, and it would take six years before she got another opportunity to record, then leading her own big band.