Trumpeter Alphonso Horne On Channeling Louis Armstrong in Broadway's A Wonderful World

On June 21, 1929, the New York Times reviewed a “noisy, high spirited, fast moving” musical revue at the Hudson Theatre called Hot Chocolates. “Cornets and saxophones blare an adequately torrid musical setting for the stage proceedings,” the critic wrote. “One song, a synthetic but entirely pleasant jazz ballad called ‘Ain’t Misbehavin’, stands out, and its rendition between the acts by an unnamed member of the orchestra was a highlight of the premiere.”

That “unnamed member” was the 29-year-old Louis Armstrong, making his Broadway debut and on the precipice of fame.

Nearly a hundred years later, Armstrong is back on Broadway. Wonderful World: The Louis Armstrong Musical follows the jazz legend’s life, from the parades and dance halls of New Orleans to the speakeasies of Chicago and the concert halls of New York.

The score is made up of songs from across Armstrong’s storied career, arranged and orchestrated by jazz luminary Branford Marsalis. The music may be written down, but the band is doing their bit to make the music feel as vital and thrilling and spontaneous as a jazz gig. “We get to take a lot of liberties that we never get to do in any other Broadway show,” said trumpeter Alphonso Horne. “If I did what I’m doing at Phantom of the Opera they would have a heart attack.”

Horne is one of several musicians behind the scenes, but in another sense, his role is central to the whole production. He provides the cornet sound of Louis Armstrong himself, while the actor James Monroe Iglehart, as Armstrong, mimes playing the instrument on stage. (It helps that Iglehart has dabbled on the instrument—before the musical made it to Broadway, he even played a few choice notes on stage in character.)

Horne has been thinking a lot lately about Armstrong’s qualities as a trumpeter and entertainer and how to channel that specific energy. “If you play 30 seconds or 10 seconds of Louis Armstrong for any professional jazz trumpet player, they will be able to tell you that that's Louis Armstrong,” he said. “One of the things about his personality is that he always presents himself as the most joyful, uplifting spirit. And that's what his playing sounds like to me. You know what I mean?”

Armstrong was not the most technically complex player. In other ways, though, his playing style is incredibly challenging to pull off. Horne told me, confidentially, he’s seen one of jazz's most prominent figures of the last 40 years struggle to emulate it. “Trumpet players will go up a little bit, they'll go down, they'll play soft, they'll play loud. Whereas Louis Armstrong is kind of riding over everything on top for long periods of time.” Think of Armstrong as the trumpet-playing equivalent of a marathon runner who keeps up a demanding pace for the entire duration of a race. “It’s hard.”

In his mid-30s, Horne is one of the busiest trumpet players working today, lauded for his immersive and electrifying performances and collaborations with the likes of Lady Gaga and Rihanna. His conversation is a bit like jazz, too, full of inspired riffs and dizzying digressions to unexpected places. His enthusiasm, like Armstrong’s, is highly infectious.

Horne grew up in Jacksonville, Florida surrounded by music. His musician father was also a brass instrument repairman—the home was strewn with instruments—who would bring the young Alphonso along to his shows. Horne took an interest in the trumpet in middle school. “I would rehearse at school, practice at school, go to my dad's music store, practice at the music store, and then we would go out to a gig later that night. I was exposed to bar gigs, crazy frat parties, all kinds of things at the age of 12.”

Initially, though, Horne’s primary passion was performing in plays and musical theater. It was his father who pushed him into “the musical prodigy thing.” “I always thought it was weird that the departments didn't collaborate more. It's like the music thing does their thing. The choir does their thing, dance does their thing.”

He continued his musical education at Florida State University, studying both classical and jazz music. During his time there, he trained with Scotty Barnhart, the director of the Count Basie Orchestra, and received mentorship from renowned bandleader Marcus Roberts​. After completing his studies at Juilliard, Horne joined the Broadway production After Midnight, where he worked closely with trumpeter and bandleader Wynton Marsalis. That experience led to a raft of interdisciplinary projects with Ars Nova, Prospect Theatre Company and the National Black Theatre, melding the musical with the theatrical.

One of Horne’s most memorable musical experiences was playing a series of gigs with the soul singer Allen Stone. “We were dancing and singing and playing really hard for two hours. Before every show, we would have a tequila shot, and we would pray—he’s the son of a pastor—and he was like, ‘I want the music to be right, but at the end of the day, I want somebody to be affected by our music and the lyrics.’ He would go into the audience, touch hands, hug people.”

That experience shaped Horne’s whole philosophy of performance. “I realized, I can’t got back to just clocking in, just playing. I was like, no, no, no. This music is meant to reach people, to affect people. If we're not doing that, what’s the point?” Today, Horne’s self-described mission statement is to really, truly connect with his audience. “How can I present this music or perform it in a way that they are affected by it? And that doesn't mean that I play Taylor Swift songs. I'm still playing jazz, but I'm presenting it in a way that people get it on any level.”

To that end, one of Horne’s passions is teaching jazz. He is a teaching artist with Jazz for Young People and Jazz Academy at Lincoln Center and Mozart for Munchkins, among others. “As a musician, I always say kids are like drunk adults. There's no filter. They will tell you like it is.” Plus, Horne said, “A lot of devices that I use with the kids actually work for adults.”

Horne’s good-vibes-only mentality is a perfect fit for the all-embracing, broadly appealing music of Louis Armstrong's era, back when "being a great artist also meant being a great entertainer.” After the jazz scene started taking itself more seriously in the 1930s and 1940s—it became music to listen to rather than music to dance to—some of the next generation of Black jazz artists made disparaging comments about Armstrong. Dizzy Gillespie called him a “plantation character.” Miles Davis said Armstrong’s personality was the result of “white people wanting black people to entertain them by smiling and jumping around”.

Horne doesn't take those put-downs seriously. “Musicians talking crap about each other—that hasn't changed,” he said. In any case, no serious and informed jazz musician today would write off Armstrong’s trailblazing contribution to popular music. “With my students even now, I'll ask them, 'Who is someone alive or the most modern person you can think of that you love listening to? I bet we can trace their influences back to Louis Armstrong.'”

How about Lizzo?

“Fine: Lizzo to Aretha Franklin; Aretha Franklin to Mahalia Jackson; Mahalia Jackson to Bessie Smith; Bessie Smith to Louis Armstrong… I could go deeper, back to Buddy Bolden, to ragtime, to march music to folk songs to the music of Africa. For me, it's a continuum. It's all super connected.”

Back in 1929, when Armstrong was performing on the Broadway stage, he would head uptown to Connie’s Inn in Harlem after the evening’s performance. One gets the sense that’s when the real fun began. “My band really used to play the hell out of Connie’s show,” Armstrong wrote.

Similarly, you can bet Horne's musical life will not be confined to his Broadway commitments for long. He's too restless for that.

“There was a time where we were doing a soundcheck and we didn’t have our [sheet music]. I was like, ‘Let’s just play ‘Bourbon Street Parade.’" Naturally, the band let rip with an exuberant, playful rendition of the tune, deliriously unrestrained by whatever musical notes might have been on the page.

"It was so much fun," said Horne. "I’m like, ‘We should just do more of that.’”