Rare film of Louis Armstrong in the recording studio discovered in abandoned storage unit

Louis Armstrong.
(Image credit: AFP/Getty Images)

More than six decades after it was recorded, the only known film of Louis Armstrong in the recording studio has been discovered and is now in the hands of the Louis Armstrong House Museum.

Michael Cogswell, executive director of the museum, told The Associated Press that "not even the most diligent Armstrong researchers knew it existed." The 33 minute, 16mm film was shot while Armstrong recorded the 1959 album Satchmo Plays King Oliver in Los Angeles. Producer Sid Frey decided to film the session, but never used the footage, and his daughter, Andrea Bass, said all of the tapes, films, albums, and mementos from her father's career ultimately ended up in a storage unit.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.