Louis Armstrong

Louis Armstrong

An American Success Story

(Childhood, Up Until 16)

There once lived a little black boy by the name of Louis Armstrong. He lived in New Orleans. A place where music is overpopulated. The little boy had practically nothing. He wore a dress and his only toys were pebbles and things. Thats how poor he was, and yet he doesn’t realize that sooner or later his music career will start and everyone while start to see him for his talent. You see Louis was literally at the lowest standards of American Society. Some dogs even had a better life than he did. Louis lived inside a slum, his parents moved to the United States hoping for a better life than they did in Africa.

Louis did have family with him, however his father practically doesn’t care for him anymore because he married another woman other than Louis’s mother. “Mayann” was the name of his mother and his uncle was called “Ike”. Inside of the slum that he grew up in Louis’s education did not go far. It ended after 3rd grade, he only knew a little bit of writing and a little bit of reading. He could still talk perfectly fine. While living in New Orleans Louis was always fascinated with music. It was all around him. The black bands would play around the slum and inside of clubs. Just because they were black didn’t mean they couldn’t enjoy music.

Everywhere there was music Louis would try to go. When a band in Lincoln park was playing he couldn’t pay admission. So he peeked through a hole in the wall and saw the band using their instruments. Thats when Louis had met three other kids his age and they started a band. It didn’t have a name and didn’t last very long, but everyday the 4 kids would get about a dollar each and for 5 cents that was enough rice for a family of four. Then once day near New Years Louis was put in jail for two days because he was seen about fire a blank pistol. It wasn’t fair though because the only reason he pulled it was cause another boy fired a blank at him.

However Louis later on is happy he was put in custody because after two days he was sent to an orphanage and was told to stay there until the master let him go back to his family. While inside the orphanage they always gave food so there was no need to worry about that and even though the clothes were a bit worn out they were free. While there the orange started up a band and was recruiting kids to part of it. After weeks of waiting to be picked for the band he was picked to be part of a choir instead. All of a sudden the master wanted Louis to be part of the band. Louis never knew why he changed his mind, but didn’t ask questions because of how excited he was.

The first instrument he got to use was called the tambourine. It was a beginner instrument and after a while the master let Louis get a drum, but he mastered that instrument as well so the master gave him a mellophone which was similar to the cornet (instrument that Louis really wanted). After the mellophone Louis was put in the lead position of the band. This made him very proud of himself and even prouder when his band went to the slum where he lived before and people started recognizing him. Finally the master let Louis borrow a cornet for the band.

Until next time…….