King of the Zulus
Lou Donaldson would be a hundred years old today, and Anna Webber's nine piece record arrives on Intakt with no track list printed. Then Silas tells the story of the one crown Louis Armstrong said he had dreamed of all his life, and the argument that followed.
LioraA hundred years ago today, Lou Donaldson was born in Badin, North Carolina. He took a degree in science first. Later, the crown Louis Armstrong told Time he had dreamed of all his life. It's Sunday. Let's go.
LioraIt's Sunday, November 1st. This is The Daily Quintet. I'm Liora. Five stories from the world of jazz, in about ten minutes. Here we go.
One. The Lead: Lou Donaldson was born a hundred years ago today in Badin, North Carolina
LioraLou Donaldson would be a hundred years old today.
The Library of Congress has the dates. Born November 1st, 1926. Its file cites the Washington Post for the end: November 9th, 2024, in Daytona Beach, Florida.
The New Grove dictionary of jazz gives him four words. Alto saxophonist and singer.
One detail first. He went to Greensboro A and T College and came away with a degree in science.
Then 1952. He records as a leader for Blue Note, and on one of those dates the Modern Jazz Quartet is the band behind him. The reference works say he spent nearly his entire career after that as a leader.
The Library files one of his bands under two names, Donaldson and Clifford Brown, with Elmo Hope on piano, Percy Heath on bass and Philly Joe Jones on drums.
LioraLate on, the honors came. An honorary doctorate of letters from North Carolina A and T. A National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master for 2013.
If you want him in the room tonight, the French national library has the record on file. "Blues Walk," on Blue Note, B L P fifteen ninety three, with Herman Foster on piano and a liner note by Ira Gitler. Six tunes, title track first.
Two. Listen to This: Anna Webber's nine piece record, it's easier to imagine the end of the world
LioraOne record came out Friday, and it brought nine people.
Anna Webber's "it's easier to imagine the end of the world," on Intakt, number four fifty nine.
Webber on tenor, soprano and flute. Ryan Easter, trumpet. Yuma Uesaka, clarinets. Ingrid Laubrock, tenor and soprano. DoYeon Kim, a twenty five string gayageum. Mary Halvorson, guitar. David Virelles, piano. Chris Tordini, bass. Ches Smith, drums and chimes. Two days at the Bunker Studio in Brooklyn, in January.
The label says the source material is writing about late stage capitalism, and that it pushed the nonet to value the collective over the individual.
LioraWebber, on the reading: "It's easy for me to get dark and stay dark right now, to imagine the worst possible ending to everything. But in my reading, I found inspiration from people who helped me imagine a different kind of future."
Here is the tip. The label printed no track list, but it put three songs out ahead of the record, and they come with it. Start with "Enoughness."
One more date. Next Friday, Intakt has Laubrock's own band, Grammy Season, with Tom Rainey on drums.
Now, New Orleans. In 1949, Louis Armstrong told Time he had dreamed all his life of one crown. Today on The Bridge, the day he wore it, and the argument that followed. Silas has it.
Three. The Bridge: In 1949 Louis Armstrong told Time he had dreamed all his life of one crown
LioraOne true story from this music's history, every day. Silas tells it, I ask the questions. Silas, where are we?
SilasNew Orleans. Shrove Tuesday, March 1st, 1949. Mardi Gras. Louis Armstrong is 48, and Time magazine calls him a world figure. Its February 21st issue put him on the cover, under the title "Music: Louis the First." And Time opened the story with Armstrong himself: "There's a thing I've dreamed of all my life...to be King of the Zulus' Parade."
LioraKing of the Zulus. What is that?
SilasThe Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club, a New Orleans Carnival club. It began in 1909 as a marching club called The Tramps, took up the Zulu theme a few years later, and incorporated in 1916. It grew out of a vaudeville skit at the Temple Theater: "There Never Was and Never Will Be a King Like Me." Armstrong became an honorary member in 1931, and that season he sponsored the club's baseball team, the Secret Nine. Time reported that the club's earlier kings were porters, shopkeepers and undertakers. In 1949, for the first time in its 33-year history, Time said, the club went outside its own community for its king. Zulu historian Clarence Becknell told Fox 8: "It was unbelievable his whole dream was to be king of Zulu."
LioraSo what does a king wear?
SilasAs Time described it before the parade: "long, black-dyed underwear and grass skirt," then "a green velvet cape and gilt cardboard crown." On the morning itself, says 64 Parishes, club members come to get him into costume, blackface makeup included. Time reported he had stocked more than 2,000 coconuts to hand out. Only the king drinks champagne, Time said, and "a flunky keeps his cup filled all day." His wife Lucille worried about how she could stay in touch with him in the crowd. His answer, as Time quoted it: "Baby, just follow the crowd."
LioraDid it go to plan?
SilasNot quite. Time had called it "a riotous 20-mile, all-day parade." By one local account, from Fox 8 in New Orleans, the royal float's chassis breaks down near North Prieur Street. Crowds are trying to reach him, so organizers take him away by limousine. After that comes a celebration at city hall. Armstrong later recalled the mayor's office "was packed and jammed with the press."
LioraAnd outside New Orleans?
SilasNot everyone cheered. The Chicago Defender complained that a "grotesquely made up Armstrong" could not be recognized "by even his most avid fan." The Pittsburgh Courier ran the headline "King Zulu Reigns (Ugh!)" By one account, from the Louis Armstrong House Museum, Dizzy Gillespie called him a "plantation character" soon after. 64 Parishes says that inside New Orleans the blackface was understood as satire of white Carnival, while outsiders read it as demeaning. Time had already written that to Armstrong, the critics' touchiness "seems absurd."
Three years later, in 1952, he was still writing about it: a four-page letter to a New Orleans Item reporter, now in the Louisiana State Museum's collection. The museum says he "relished every moment of his reign."
LioraOne man's lifelong dream, and a country arguing over what it looked like. That's The Bridge. Back to today, right after this.
Four. On the Road: The Blue Note bills Robert Glasper X Finale with Meshell Ndegeocello and Chris Dave
LioraTonight, coast to coast.
Tonight's ticket is in New York.
The Blue Note files it under appearing tonight: Robert Glasper X Finale, with Meshell Ndegeocello and Chris Dave. Two sets, eight and half past ten. The club prints no ticket price, only a twenty dollar minimum a head.
Now the sweep.
In Chicago, the Green Mill has Soul Message, eight to midnight, a ten dollar cover. Chris Foreman on the Hammond B-3, Greg Jung on alto, Greg Rockingham on drums.
In Detroit, Cliff Bell's goes early: the Laith Al-Saadi Organ Trio, half past five and half past seven, doors at five for dinner, thirty dollars. Chris Codish is on the Hammond B3.
In Washington, Blues Alley has a record release from the Stephen Philip Harvey Octet, half past five and eight, thirty five dollars plus a seven dollar fee.
LioraIn Denver, Dazzle has Adrian Crutchfield and BigPocket, doors at half past five. The room prints two start times, six and half past six.
Five. One More Note: Finland's Yrjo Award went to the saxophonist Pauli Lyytinen
LioraA loose end from Friday. We said Finland was handing out the Yrjo Award in Tampere that night and nobody had printed the winner. The Federation has now. It is the saxophonist Pauli Lyytinen.
The lifetime prize, the Andania, went to the Dallape orchestra, which the Federation calls Europe's oldest continuously active entertainment orchestra. The prize is named for a ship credited, symbolically, with bringing jazz to Finland in 1926.
Which is the year Lou Donaldson was born.
Outro
LioraThat's the Quintet. If today's show earned it, follow The Daily Quintet wherever you listen.
The Daily Quintet is an AI-crafted production, researched and checked by humans. Every listing you heard came from the venue, the venue's own ticketing partner, or the festival's own organizer.
A hundred years of Lou Donaldson. I'm Liora. See you tomorrow.