Louis Armstrong made music for people. It was important to him to

communicate in all directions, both with his colleagues on stage and with the

audience. In the 1950s he became one of the most famous jazz musicians,

but also known beyond the sphere of jazz, even though many listeners had

already turned towards pop and rock & roll.

The 1950s were for Armstrong all in all an ambivalent decade. The audience

loved him, but if their skin colour was black they were not allowed to attend

some of his concerts in his homeland. At any rate, Armstrong was frequently

on the road: in 1956 on his acclaimed tour of Africa, a year later in South

America, and repeatedly in Europe, performing concerts with his All Stars in

Stockholm, Umeå, Copenhagen, Amsterdam and also in Stuttgart, in 1959.

With him in the Liederhalle was his proven team of Trummy Young, Peanuts

Hucko, Billy Kyle, Mort Herbert, Danny Barcelona and the blues singer Velma

Middleton with a programme ranging from his theme song When It’s Sleep

Time Down South to earworms like Mack The Knife. The concert in the

Liederhalle is one of the unclouded high-points before the strenuous life of

the jazz superstar began to take its toll on his work.