“The Greatest Photo Taker”: Remembering Jack Bradley Part 44–Backstage at the Latin Quarter April 1968

In our previous post, Louis Armstrong found out he had a number one hit in England with “What a Wonderful World,” printed up a new diet chart, and prepared for his first New York City nightclub engagement in seven years, opening at the Latin Quarter on April 17. We shared a number of wonderful Jack Bradley photos of Armstrong and the All Stars onstage during a rehearsal for this two-week run; today’s post will be the opposite, focusing on photos Bradley took of Armstrong offstage during this period.

We open, though, with a new face, working for the New York Blood Center and in the following photo, assisting Jack Bradley himself:

That mystery man is Hayes Alvis, who played bass for Armstrong’s big band, as well as Duke Ellington and other jazz giants, during the Swing Era:

According to his New York Times obituary, Alvis had just taken the job in 1968 as labor coordinator with the American Red Cross after years of working for the Musician’s Union 802, so perhaps Bradley was making his first visit to Alvis’s new office. Bradley was also meeting Armstrong at the Latin Quarter that day and was excited to photograph this reunion between the bassist and his former boss. At first, Armstrong’s attention seemed to wander as Bradley snapped this image:

But then Armstrong spotted Bradley’s camera and turned on the show business smile:

Alvis split the scene, but Bradley shot another photo of Louis at a table with an unidentified woman; there’s a “Latin Quarter” sign in the background (Bradley’s girlfriend Jeann “Roni” Failows can also be spotted) so we know we’re in the right place, but sadly, we don’t know who the mystery woman is; perhaps just a Latin Quarter employee:

Bradley followed Armstrong backstage, where he got changed alongside wife Lucille and yet another mystery woman. He looks pretty tired in these photos:

Perhaps the tiredness exhibited in those photos is a good jumping off point for our rare audio share of this post. Joe Franklin was a legendary broadcaster–and character–in New York for several decades, known for hosting a somewhat bizarre, but beloved TV talk show, in addition to spinning records on his WOR radio program. In 1968, Franklin procured an interview with Armstrong backstage at the Latin Quarter and played it during an episode of his radio show. Needing a special guest to help talk about Louis and set up the interview, Franklin chose Jack Bradley! And because the charm of Franklin’s show was his ability to mix and match guests from different backgrounds, Bradley is also joined by Harry Simeone, co-writer of “The Little Drummer Boy” and leader of the Harry Simeone Chorale. Here’s the original tape box, as sent to Louis:

Almost immediately, Franklin mentions Armstrong having trouble getting around, which Bradley blames on a nasty fall he took during the rehearsal for his appearance performing “The Bare Necessities” at the Academy Awards, which took place on April 12, just five days before the Latin Quarter opening. At 3:44, Franklin asks about the role of African Americans in jazz. Bradley gives a very thoughtful reply, insisting they had not received their due, but when Simeone disagrees with that assessment, Franklin seems to sense some tension and changes the subject.

After commercials and some conversation with Simeone, Franklin asks Bradley for some “flash reactions” at 11:30, asking about Duke Ellington, Fletcher Henderson, Ted Lewis, Billie Holiday, Jerome Richardson, Bessie Smith, and more. Jack also mentions Louis’s “What a Wonderful World” being a number one hit in England but in America, “hardly anyone’s heard about it.” More talk follows, on Paul Robeson and musicians getting formal training, before Franklin reads some commercials.

At 20:10, Franklin sets up his interview with Armstrong, though he notes to Bradley that Armstrong seemed uncomfortable when asked about his Little Rock statements. Jack offers a diplomatic answer about Louis’s devotion to music and how he “preaches peace and love with his horn” but Franklin isn’t wrong; Armstrong was burned by the response to his Little Rock comments (chronicled here) and spent much of the 1960s keeping those opinions to private settings among trusted friends–like Bradley–and not on radio broadcasts.

After one commercial, Franklin’s interview with Armstrong begins at 22:50. As Franklin notes, there’s a buzz throughout, most likely caused by a loose wire, but it’s still a valuable interview as it does present Armstrong in a quieter mood than the Tonight Show appearances we’ve been sharing lately. Franklin starts off with softball questions about acquiring the name “Satchmo” and Louis wearing a catcher’s mask in South America, but then goes right into Little Rock, less than a minute in. “I never both with yesterday’s news,” Louis responds and Franklin gets the hint, changing the subject to ask about playing for teenagers. Franklin continues with rapid fire questions on where Louis got his first horn (the Colored Waif’s Home) and on his memories of King Oliver. Armstrong comes alive talking about Oliver, but he seems to bristle slightly again at the mention of Bunk Johnson giving him lessons, which Armstrong stresses never happened. Louis reminisces about coming to New York with Fletcher Henderson before Franklin asks about rehearsing for recording dates; Louis insists that you have to rehearse before a session, something demonstrated in this series by the many photographs we’ve shared that Jack Bradley took at rehearsals for recordings.

At 27:45, Franklin again sets off a red flag with his question about jazz musicians being criticized for “going commercial.” There are multiple examples of Armstrong bristling at such a notion and it’s good to hear him here, asking with an annoyed tone, “Well, what is commercial?” When Franklin refers to the critics as “they,” Armstrong snaps back, “I don’t care they say, I live Louis Armstrong. Nobody tells me how to blow that horn and what to put in that horn, and when I sing and nobody can tell me what to do, so they’re wasting their time. The ones you’re talking about, those cats you talking about can’t even get a job. They can’t even hold a job so they’re going to criticize a man that’s working all the time.”

“Right,” Franklin responds, “They can criticize, they can criticize.”

“They can do more than that if I wasn’t on the mike,” Armstrong jokes, finally breaking into a laugh. “That’s the way I feel. Nobody changes Louis Armstrong in music.” It’s nice to hear this tougher side of Armstrong; you know it’s serious when he starts referring to himself in third person!

Now feeling feisty, Armstrong talks about how he has every record he ever made and how he likes all music that’s good, before reminiscing about New Orleans funerals and playing the riverboats with Fate Marable. Armstrong praises Bix Beiderbecke but when pressed to name more favorites, Armstrong punts, saying he respects all musicians he’s played with and all audiences he’s played for.

At 30:20, composer Jimmy McHugh joins the party and gives Armstrong quite a beautiful tribute, listing some of the songs he wrote that Armstrong recorded over the years, including “On the Sunny Side of the Street” and “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love.” Armstrong and McHugh have a charming lovefest, but probably for the last time; though Franklin promises “the best is yet to come,” in one year, Armstrong would be in intensive care and McHugh would be dead, making this recorded reunion extra touching.

At 32:40, Armstrong says it’s not possible to teach improvisation and that “the nice things that you put in there have to come from you. You’ve got to figure that out yourself.” Armstrong then finally talks about his weight loss and even has Franklin read from one of his new “Lose Weight the Satchmo Way” diet charts. Franklin’s stream of conscious style results in a question about rock, causing Louis to answer that he doesn’t worry about other styles, saying, “What’s in me, I play.” Profound!

As Franklin winds down at 35:00, he invokes a question first asked by Edward R. Murrow in 1955 about the relationship between gut-bucket and boogie-woogie. Armstrong responds that all those styles were thought of by bookers looking to make money off the music, before dispensing with two final bits of wisdom: “There ain’t but two ways to play and that’s right and wrong. And there ain’t but two kinds of music, good and bad.” Armstrong adds that jazz came from classical music “if they got any soul at all,” summing it up with “it’s all music.”

Franklin squeezes in one more question about if Louis’s parents were proud of him and Louis says, yes, they were even proud of him when he was a newsboy. But that “they” quickly gives way to singular stories about how his beloved mother Mayann, leaving his father out of the conversation. Naturally, Louis ties it up by bringing up his laxative habit, which he says was inspired by Mayann’s advice. Armstrong finally gets worked up to his usual enthusiastic level, even singing a bit, inspired by the power of the laxative.

After another false finish, Armstrong mentions how he met Lucille at the Latin Quarter when it was used to be the Cotton Club in 1939. Franklin wraps up yet again and asks, “Was it nice, Louie?” But Armstrong, with Lucille still on the brain, responds, “Ohhh, it’s stilll nice. What you think?”

Jack Bradley gives his impression of the interview at 37:50, saying Louis’s love for people came shining out and how there’ll never be another. Harry Simeone’s takeaway was the importance of how music should be rehearsed and organized. The rest of the tape is turned over to more Franklin commercials and a recording of the Harry Simeone Chorale, which we’re including for completeness, but that concludes the Armstrong portion of the tape.

And with the description out of the way, here’s the audio!

We’ve gotten Armstrong into the Latin Quarter, watched him get changed, and listened to him talk with Joe Franklin–now it’s time to visit him backstage as he greeted the many special guests in attendance who came to see him. We’ll start at the top with the great Pearl Bailey and her husband Louie Bellson; their presence had Pops beaming:

In between Bailey and Bellson in this next photo is actress and vocalist Chris Calloway, Cab Calloway’s daughter:

With so many great vocalists in the house, Armstrong’s own singer, Jewel Brown, had to join in on the fun:

The above photos were all taken by Jack Bradley but for the sake of completeness, here’s a photo found in Louis’s personal collection, annotated in green ink by Armstrong himself. This particular image wasn’t found in Bradley’s negatives so it’s probable that the Latin Quarter had a photographer on staff backstage for such moments:

Here’s Armstrong and disc jockey Fred Robbins, who would deliver the eulogy at Armstrong’s funeral three years later:

The woman in the next series of photos is Pauline Rivelli, editor of Jazz & Pop magazine, which had run several features on Armstrong (mostly when it was just Jazz magazine) of the years, making great use of Bradley’s photos:

As you can see in the above photo, Rivelli brought along a Jazz and Pop award to be presented to the Beatles–why did she bring to Louis? The truth is Armstrong won the magazine’s Readers Poll as Best Male Vocalist but Rivelli didn’t have that specific award on hand, so they used the Beatles’s one as a stand-in. Here’s the resulting page in the June 1968 issue of Jazz and Pop, with the award cropped out; wild to see Louis in such august company as Janis Joplin, Frank Zappa (represented by Moon Unit Zappa), Jimmy Smith, Gary Burton, Oliver Nelson, and Duke Ellington:

That particular photo was not one of Jack Bradley’s, but Jack did take two more images of Armstrong and Rivelli that are worth sharing:

In that same June 1968 issue of Jazz and Pop, I found this little write-up from Rivelli:

“Louis Armstrong’s recording of ‘What a Wonderful World’ is currently the no. 1 best selling record in Britain. We have learned that the record is now on the best selling charts in Sweden, Germany, Holland, Denmark and Japan and is rapidly developing into a world wide hit for Pops.
“Appearing at New York’s Latin Quarter April 17 to 30th Louis included ‘What a Wonderful World’ in his repertoire and you could hear a tear drop while he sang it.
“Louis will be touring Europe in June, then to California to finish filming Hello, Dolly starring Barbra Streisand.
“Louis Armstrong celebrates his 68th birthday on July 4. We asked Louis, who is in perfect health, how he keeps up the busy schedule yet looks so great. He said, ‘It’s diet, baby’ and graciously gave the editor a copy of his 9-day diet play. You can have a copy if you’d like. Just write to us and ask.”

Back to the backstage area, here’s Virginia Kaminsky, wife of trumpeter Max Kaminsky:

Here’s a fun gathering joining Louis in an “Oh yeah”: from left to right, Dan Morgenstern, Jeann “Roni” Failows, pianist Chuck Folds, Louis, unknown, and trumpeter Leon Eason:

Same group, no longer singing; it’s a real Bradley-centric gathering of friends but when I asked Jack about it in 2015, he could no longer remember the name of the man between Louis and Leon. If anyone knows, please let us know! (And all hail, Dan Morgenstern, the last man standing from this gathering!)

I don’t know the identify of the two women in this next photo, but the man on the right whom Louis is looking at so lovingly is his adopted son, Clarence Hatfield Armstrong:

As discussed in this post, Clarence married a woman named Evelyn Allen, who had a son, Leon, better known as “Sonny”; here’s Sonny, Louis and Clarence:

And here’s Evelyn Allen:

Jack couldn’t remember the identity of this man either, but there’s Leon Eason again in the background; any ideas?

Switching away from Jack Bradley’s negatives for a moment, here are two more Latin Quarter photos found in one of Louis’s scrapbooks. The first features Louis, Lucille and an unidentified woman:

And here’s one annotated by Louis, as he’s surrounded by Charlotte, Mom Boyd, and Dorothy–wish we knew more about them!

Back to Jack’s negatives, we feel it’s only fitting to close with the two people most responsible for this ongoing series of posts. First up, Jeann “Roni” Failows:

And the man himself, Jack Bradley, with The Man himself, Louis Armstrong:

Before leaving the Latin Quarter for good, Bradley saved a few news clippings about the engagement that are worth sharing. First off, in the middle column, Robert Sylvester’s glowing review of Armstrong’s opening night in the New York Daily News:

And to kind of end at the beginning, this Jack O’Brian column from April 12 was published before the Latin Quarter, but it does a good job of summing up Armstrong’s busy 1968 up to this point, with a preview of his equally busy schedule from May through September:

Indeed, because of that busy schedule, Armstrong and Bradley wouldn’t see each other during the month of May, a time Armstrong mostly spent in Hollywood, filming Hello, Dolly! and recording the rest of the album “Disney Songs the Satchmo,” in addition to high profile performances in Toronto and the New Orleans Jazzfest.

Armstrong did keep in touch with Bradley during this period–for a very humorous reason. After printing up the “Lose Weight the Satchmo Way” diet charts in March, Armstrong wanted to go one step further. Back in 1957, Armstrong posed for a photo for his annual Christmas card–sitting on the toilet of his Corona, Queens bathroom! “Merry Swiss Kriss,” the accompanying text read, a plug of Armstrong’s laxative of choice. That photo was taken by Armstrong’s friend Lonnie Chi, who eventually worked up a more “family friendly” visual of the photo of Armstrong on the toilet as seen through a mock keyhole. By the early 1960s, Armstrong had blown that keyhole photo up into 8 x 10 form; home movie footage shot by Armstrong’s former bandleader Luis Russell of a party at the Armstrong House includes a scene of Louis in his den autographing this glossy version of the keyhole photo!

Flash forward to 1968 and someone–most likely Louis–gets the idea that if Louis is passing out diet charts, maybe he could pass out a small, wallet-sized version of the keyhole photo. Armstrong went to Jack Bradley to help him with this and Bradley gave him a bunch before Armstrong departed for Hollywood. Well, you can imagine Bradley’s surprise when he received the following two-page telegram from the set of Hello, Dolly!–the keyhole cards were a huge hit and Louis needed more!

Isn’t that hilarious? There’s also some nice things on page two about Barbra Streisand and the making of Dolly, along with a reference to a song Louis hoped to write with Bradley and Failows, “We’re All Nuts”–definitely an inside joke!

Two weeks later, Bradley and Failows received the following envelope in the mail, sent from Louis while in Toronto:

Inside? Behold–the Swiss Kriss keyhole photo!

And check out the hilarious inscription on the back:

Louis also folded up a diet chart, which he inscribed with some truly off-the-wall writings. There’s another mention of receiving the latest batch of keyhole photos and they’re “damn near gone already.” There’s a mention of a “cute lil gal” from Toronto who knew Bradley and Failows, praise for the audience, another plug of “We’re All Nuts,” and more!

It’s hard to top that one so we’ll put an end to this post, but we’re still far from the end of this series. Louis and Lucille returned from their travels in June, invited Jack and Jeann to their home and to a gig in Philadelphia. Jack brought his tape recorder to the hang and his camera to the gig and we’ll have it all to share in our next installment.