By Gloria Negri, Globe Staff, 8/1/2003
Howard "Louie Bluie'' Armstrong, a legendary string-band fiddler who dazzled
generations of audiences with his virtuosity from blues to bluegrass to folk
and jazz, died Wednesday at Boston Medical Center from complications that
developed after a heart attack in March.
Mr. Armstrong, who lived in Boston, was 96 - a fact he kept secret from his
wife. His age had always been a matter of mystery, Barbara Ward Armstrong said
yesterday, because when he wooed her 20 years ago, he told her he was 55.
''Once, he let slip that he would never forget the bombing of Pearl Harbor,''
she chuckled, ''and he conceded to being 73, though he looked about 50.'' She
didn't know until his death that she was more than 30 years his junior.
A composer as well as an instrumentalist and a singer, Mr. Armstrong took up
the fiddle at age 9 in his hometown of LaFollette, Tenn., teaching himself to
play a small fiddle made by his father, a blast furnace operator.
Mr. Armstrong learned to play 20 instruments, including the mandolin, violin,
viola, and banjo. He also became an accomplished painter and was fluent in
seven languages.
He performed across the country and was the subject of two PBS documentary
films, Terry Swigoff's ''Louie Bluie Armstrong'' in 1985 and Leah Mahan's
''Sweet Old Song'' last year.
In it, Mahan, a close friend of the Armstrongs, tells the story of the love
affair between Mr. Armstrong and his wife, a soft-sculpture and fabric artist.
The film showed the ''almost symbiotic relationship between the two,'' a Globe
interviewer wrote. ''She plays percussion in his bands, and he's illustrating a
children's book she's writing about her childhood.''
Described in a 2000 Globe article as ''the last of the great string band
musicians,'' Mr. Armstrong reportedly liked the film. ''It makes me feel very
nice when people think you've done something with your time,'' he told the
Globe.
Mr. Armstrong, not to be confused with the jazz trumpeter Louis Armstrong, was
often asked how he got the nickname, ''Louie Bluie.''
A great raconteur, he would tell people, according to a 1999 Globe interview,
that it originated at a party in West Virginia, ''when I was 21 or 22.
''My band, the Four Keys, was playing and, this girl, who was seditty - you
know, snobby, upper-crusty - she'd had too much to drink. Well, I'm sure it
wasn't beer, it wasn't whiskey - I'm sure it was champagne - and she sort of
floated over and blurted out to me, like spit it out: `I know you're Armstrong,
but not Louis Armstrong. You're just plain old Louie Bluie.''
Mr. Armstrong was born in Dayton, Tenn., the site of the famous Scopes
evolution trial, and grew up in nearby LaFollette. He was one of nine children.
In 1999, he told a Globe interviewer that he had played and recorded with his
brothers in groups called the Armstrong Brothers, the Four Keys, and the
Chocolate Drops.
Their venues were anywhere there were people to listen, he said, ''in bars, in
West Virginia coal fields, at juke joints, dances, and at medicine shows.''
Mr. Armstrong continued to play well into his advanced years. A regular at Club
Passim, the Harvard Square music club, he made one of his last appearances
there at age 90. A 1997 Globe story on his rehearsal at a friend's art studio
described how he displayed ''some vigorous fiddling on ''Cacklin' Hen,'' his
feet keeping hoedown rhythm on the rippled oak floor.''
Mr. Armstrong had been energetic until his heart attack in March shortly after
the couple traveled to Nashville so he could accept the Governor's Awards in
the Arts. Dolly Parton was another recipient.
For many years, the Armstrongs, who met when he played Boston in 1983, traveled
with his band and made Boston their permanent home in 1996. Mr. Armstrong's
recordings, released by Vocalion Records, included ''Vine Street Drag'' and
''Knox County Stomp.''
In 1997, Mr. Armstrong told The Chicago Sun-Times that the secret to great
fiddling was to treat the instrument with tenderness.
''It is hard to get the right tone out of a violin or fiddle. A lot of people
just saw it and saw it and make all kinds of cat squawks and squeaks,'' he
said. ''Many people fake it. Very few white musicians can play blues on the
fiddle. They play in a country-western step or swing whittlin' and diddlin' on
it. They mix it up.''
Mr. Armstrong also played to have an impact.
''Howard's whole thing was to keep his music going, especially encouraging kids
of color to open their minds to all kinds of music,'' his wife said.
In 1986, he talked to the Los Angeles Times about his views on growing old:
''You didn't come here to stay forever. But it's not how long you live'' that
matters, but what you accomplish, he said. ''An old proverb by some philosopher
said, `Upon him who is of a bright and sunny disposition, the weight of the
years hang lightly. But to him who is of a negative and disgruntled attitude,
youth and old age are equally a burden.''
Besides his wife, Mr. Armstrong leaves three sons from an earlier marriage,
Ralphe, Will, and Robert, all of Detroit; as well as many grandchildren and
great-grandchildren.
In September, Club Passim will hold a fund-raiser to provide music lessons for
needy children in Mr. Armstrong's name, his wife said.
Funeral arrangements are incomplete. Burial will be in Forest Hills Cemetery in
Jamaica Plain.
This story ran on page E13 of the Boston Globe on 8/1/2003.
© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.