• DOI:10.1086/343233
• Corpus ID: 224798051

Louis Armstrong and the Syntax of Scat

@article{HayesEdwards2002LouisAA,
  title={Louis Armstrong and the Syntax of Scat},
  author={Brent Hayes Edwards},
  journal={Critical Inquiry},
  year={2002},
  volume={28},
  pages={618 - 649}
}

• Brent Hayes Edwards
• Published 1 March 2002
• Art
• Critical Inquiry

618 Early versions of this paper were presented first in May 2000 at “Rhythm-a-ning: A Symposium on Jazz Culture” and then in December 2000 as a lecture at the Center for Jazz Studies, both at Columbia University. I am grateful to Robert G. O’Meally for those invitations and for discussing the project with me on a number of occasions. The essay has also benefited from the suggestions and comments of two other audiences: the Performance of Culture seminar at the Center for the Critical Analysis of ContemporaryCulture at Rutgers University and the department of English at Johns Hopkins University. I would also like to thank Michael Cogswell at the Armstrong Archives at Queens College, Phoebe Jacobs at the Louis Armstrong Foundation, and the staff in the Music Division at the Library of Congress. I thank Krin Gabbard and Robert Walser for their detailed suggestions. 1. Boyd Atkins, “Heebie Jeebies” (Chicago, 1926), pp. 3–4. This source can be found in the Sheet Music Collection, Music Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. The sheet music was published after Armstrong’s single, apparently in response to the record’s popularity; it goes so far as to include a transcription of Armstrong’s improvisation as a “‘Skat’ Chorus” (p. 5), in which the piano accompanimentmirrors the melody and rhythm of Armstrong’s scatting (“Skeep! Skipe! Skoop! Brip Ber Breep bar la bah”). At the same time, the sheet music signals the inadequacy of its notation, glossing the transcriptionwith the instruction that “Note: for correct interpretation of ‘SKAT’ CHORUS HEAR OKEH RECORD No. 8300.” Louis Armstrong and the Syntax of Scat