Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
Actor/musician Bill White is exuberant in the title role of Satchmo, even playing many of the jazz great's songs on cornet.
By LORRIE LYKINS
© St. Petersburg Times, published February 11, 2003
TAMPA -- Jazz great Louis Armstrong undoubtedly lives on in the music he created. And if you close your eyes, Louis really does live. The beat accelerates, the rhythm pounds, the vocals are unmistakable. You're at the Savoy with Satchmo and his Stompers and you can't sit still.
Okay, you're in Tampa, at the Center Theater Company's production of Satchmo: The Life and Times of Louis Armstrong, but it feels like you traveled through time to get here.
In the title role, actor/musician Bill White greets the audience with a scampish grin and a perfectly pitched, "Oh, yeah!" The gravelly voice vibrates with a familiar smoothness, and White is the exuberant embodiment of Armstrong.
The cabaret musical showcases White's unique comfort and intimacy with the role he plays. He not only sounds like Armstrong; he plays a mean cornet. Backed by a seven-member jazz band that scats, swings, bebops and rocks, White impressively blows his way through many of the 32 numbers in the show, including Heebie Jeebies, Sweet Georgia Brown, Ain't Misbehavin', and (When It's) Sleepy Time Down South.
Written and directed by Claude McNeal, Satchmo is based on journals and correspondence written by Armstrong, an avid diarist and observer. The show opens with an aging Armstrong seated behind a typewriter, reviewing his memoirs. He's joined by Joe Glaser (Jonathan Harrison), his manager of 35 years. Glaser alternately acts as narrator and active participant in the story, reading aloud from Satchmo's manuscript, reminiscing and occasionally arguing with Armstrong's recollections. Harrison moves smoothly through additional characterizations, including Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra.
The enduring friendship between Armstrong and Glaser is an underlying theme in Satchmo, one that Harrison and White play well. Glaser occasionally objects to Armstrong's candor on issues such as racism, social justice and drug use. (Once arrested for possession of marijuana, Armstrong wrote an impassioned letter to President Dwight Eisenhower outlining his position that marijuana ought to be legalized. Eisenhower never replied.)
Yolanda Williams and LaDonna Burns also handle multiple roles, bringing to life legends Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Velma Middleton and Pearl Bailey, as well as two of Armstrong's three wives, Lil and Lucille. Both Williams and Burns deliver solid vocals, dancing and characterizations, adding liveliness and enthusiasm to a fast-moving pace that covers five decades.
Imaginative period costumes by producing manager Rick Criswell and Scott Cooper's set add to the fluidity of the show. Two projection screens stream with timelines, captions, quotes and photos of Armstrong and his colleagues throughout his career.
As the show closes with A Kiss to Build a Dream On and What a Wonderful World, it's over too soon.
REVIEW: Satchmo: The Life and Times of Louis Armstrong continues through April 19, Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, 1010 N MacInnes Place, Tampa. 7:30 p.m. Wed. and Thur., 8 p.m. Fri., 2 and 8 p.m. Sat., 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sun., $26.50-$29.50. (813) 229-7827 or toll-free 1-800-955-1045; or www.tbpac.org.