His actual presence gave me, in a sense, a shock, and I much regret to have to admit to finding something of the barbaric in his violent stage mannerisms.
The young Jewish element at the back was enthusiastic.
As for Armstrong himself, he was
the ugliest man I have seen on the music-hall stage. He looks, and behaves, like an untrained gorilla.
This savage growling is as far removed from English as we speak or sing it—and as modern—as James Joyce.
—Pops, by Terry Teachout, pp. 186-87