Name: Satchmo at the Waldorf
Start: 2023-02-26T00:00:00
Location: San Jose Stage

L. Peter Callender

Ted Lange

Maurice Vercoutere

Guilio  Cesare Perrone

Ashley Garlick

Steve Schoenbeck

San Jose Stage Company

SATCHMO AT THE WALDORF is a one-man, three-character play in which the same actor portrays Louis Armstrong, the greatest of all jazz trumpeters; Joe Glaser, his white manager; and Miles Davis, who admired Armstrong’s playing but disliked his onstage manner. It takes place in 1971 in a dressing room backstage at the Empire Room of New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, where Armstrong performed in public for the last time four months before his death. Reminiscing into a tape recorder about his life and work, Armstrong seeks to come to terms with his longstanding relationship with Glaser, whom he once loved like a father but now believes to have betrayed him. In alternating scenes, Glaser defends his controversial decision to promote Armstrong’s career (with the help of the Chicago mob) by encouraging him to simplify his musical style, while Davis attacks Armstrong for pandering to white audiences.

EPSG:4326

Satchmo at the Waldorf

San Jose Stage