Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an inventive trumpet and cornet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the focus of the music from collective improvisation to solo performance. With his instantly-recognizable gravelly voice, Armstrong was also an influential singer, demonstrating great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also skilled at scat singing (vocalizing using sounds and syllables instead of actual lyrics).
Renowned for his charismatic stage presence and voice almost as much as for his trumpet-playing, Armstrong's influence extends well beyond jazz music, and by the end of his career in the 1960s, he was widely regarded as a profound influence on popular music in general. Armstrong was one of the first truly popular African-American entertainers to "cross over", whose skin-color was secondary to his music in an America that was severely racially divided. He rarely publicly politicized his race, often to the dismay of fellow African-Americans, but took a well-publicized stand for desegregation during the Little Rock Crisis. His artistry and personality allowed him socially acceptable access to the upper echelons of American society that were highly restricted for a black man.
Armstrong was born and brought up in New Orleans, a culturally diverse town with a unique musical mix of creole, ragtime, marching bands, and blues. Although from an early age he was able to play music professionally, he didn't travel far from New Orleans until 1922, when he went to Chicago to join his mentor, King Oliver. Oliver's band played primitive jazz, a hotter style of ragtime, with looser rhythms and more improvisation, and Armstrong's role was mostly backing. Slow to promote himself, he was eventually persuaded by his wife Lil Hardin to leave Oliver, and In 1924 he went to New York to join the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra. At the time, there were a few other artists using the rhythmic innovations of the New Orleans style, but none did it with the energy and brilliance of Armstrong, and he quickly became a sensation among New York musicians. Back in Chicago in 1925, he made his first recordings with his own group, Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five, and these became not only popular hits but also models for the first generation of jazz musicians, trumpeters or otherwise.
Other hits followed through the twenties and thirties, as well as troubles: crooked managers, lip injuries, mob entanglements, failed big-band ventures. As jazz styles changed, though, musical purists never lost any respect for him -- although they were sometimes irritated by his hammy onstage persona. Around the late forties, with the help of a good manager, Armstrong's business affairs finally stablilized, and he began to be seen as an elder statesman of American popular entertainment, appearing in Hollywood films, touring Asia and Europe, and dislodging The Beatles from the number-one position with Hello Dolly". Today many people may know him as a singer (a good one), but as Miles Davis said: “You can’t play nothing on modern trumpet that doesn’t come from him."
The 62-year-old Armstrong became the oldest act to top the US charts when "Hello Dolly" reached #1 in 1964. Four years later Satchmo also became the oldest artist to record a UK #1, when "What a Wonderful World" hit the top spot.
I Get Ideas
Louis Armstrong Lyrics
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I get ideas, I get ideas
I want to hold you so much closer than I dare to
I want to scold you 'cause I care more than I care to
And when you touch me and there's fire in every finger
I get ideas, yes, I get ideas
And after we have kissed goodnight and still you linger
Your eyes are always saying the things you're never saying
I only hope they're saying that you could love me, too
For that's the whole idea, it's true
Lovely idea that I'm falling in love with you
And after we have kissed goodnight and still you linger
Babe, I kinda think you get ideas, too
Louis Armstrong's song "I Get Ideas" is a love song that describes the emotions of the singer when he is near his lover. He starts off by saying that when they are dancing and she is dangerously near him, he gets ideas that he wants to hold her closer than he usually does. He feels the desire to scold her because he cares more than he cares to admit. The touch of his lover ignites a fire within him and he gets ideas that he never had before.
The lyrics describe the emotions of a person who is deeply in love and is afraid to express his or her feelings. The singer feels that his lover's eyes say things that she never says aloud. He wonders if her eyes are saying that she loves him too; the whole idea behind his emotions.
The chorus of the song emphasizes the singer's love, and how he hopes that his lover reciprocates it. At the end of the song, he says that even when they have kissed goodnight, his lover lingers and he thinks that she gets ideas about him too.
Overall, "I Get Ideas" is a sweet and romantic song that expresses love in a simple yet powerful way.
Line by Line Meaning
When we are dancing and you're dangerously near me
When we're dancing and you're standing so close that it's risky for me emotionally, I start having thoughts about you
I get ideas, I get ideas
I start getting all these intense feelings and thoughts about you
I want to hold you so much closer than I dare to
I have a strong desire to hold you closer to me than I feel comfortable with
I want to scold you 'cause I care more than I care to
I want to reprimand you for getting me so emotionally attached, even though I care more about you than I'm willing to admit
And when you touch me and there's fire in every finger
When you touch me, it's like there's an intense physical spark between us
I get ideas, yes, I get ideas
All these powerful thoughts and emotions flood my mind
And after we have kissed goodnight and still you linger
Even after we've said goodnight and you're still here, I wonder if you're feeling the same way I am
I kinda think you get ideas, too
I suspect that you're also having some strong emotions and thoughts about our connection
Your eyes are always saying the things you're never saying
Even though you're not verbally expressing yourself, I can see from the way you look at me that there's something more going on
I only hope they're saying that you could love me, too
I'm hoping that your eyes are conveying the message that you have the potential to love me in the same way that I love you
For that's the whole idea, it's true
Because my whole intention behind these feelings and thoughts is to express my love for you
Lovely idea that I'm falling in love with you
It's a beautiful realization that I'm falling in love with you
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, MUSIC.INFO FINLAND OY, Peermusic Publishing, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Julio C. Sanders, Dorcas Cochran
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
MrKlemps
Vintage Pops. Great trumpet, great vocal. 5 stars.