Wonderful. ‘One of the greatest recordings of jazz history,’ Nat Hentoff wrote in Down Beat.
Try Louis’ opening duet with Velma Middleton, an extravagantly affirmative New Orleans blues about sex, sexual attraction, sexual exploitation, sexual violence and death. A massive, rumbling groove, with choice male-female banter, and extended soloing, sent from heaven.
‘He always had a sense of humour so lacking in musicians of today,’ said Sun Ra. ‘He is part of my destiny.’

Zingers from five different nightclub engagements, mostly drawn from Pops’ personal reel-to-reel collection — at Bop City in New York in 1950, Club Hangover in San Francisco in 1952, Storyville in Boston in 1953, Basin Street in New York in 1955 and the Brant Inn in Ontario in 1958 — featuring five different iterations of Armstrong’s All Stars, including such luminaries as Jack Teagarden, Barney Bigard, Earl Hines, Arvell Shaw, Cozy Cole, Marty Napoleon, Milt Hinton, Barrett Deems, Edmond Hall…

Irresistible duets from 1955 (with Again and Porgy & Bess to come).
Their stylistic incompatibility is the spark: spontaneity, love, respect, and consummate musicianship shine the brighter.