What is there to say about the great Louis Armstrong and his work? Well, it's definitely already been said, and by people whose opinions matter exponentially more than that of a smalltime critic. Any decent Louis Armstrong anthology gives proof to the praises that follow, and this is a far better than decent anthology. It is a judiciously chosen and clearly re-mastered audio monument to a colossus: "What he does is real, and true, and honest, and simple, and even noble. Every time this man puts his trumpet to his lips, even if only to practice three notes, he does it with his whole soul." - Leonard Bernstein on Louis Armstrong; "Louis Armstrong is the master of the jazz solo. He became the beacon, the light in the tower, that helped the rest of us navigate the tricky waters of jazz improvisation." -- Ellis Marsalis; "Armstrong is to music what Einstein is to physics and the Wright Brothers are to travel." -- "Jazz" documentary producer Ken Burns; "(Armstrong was) the key creator of the mature working language of jazz. Three decades after his death and more than three-quarters of a century since his influence first began to spread, not a single musician who has mastered that language fails to make daily use, knowingly or unknowingly, of something that was invented by Louis Armstrong."-- Dan Morgenstern - Oxford Companion to Jazz; "It's America's classical music ... this becomes our tradition ... the bottom line of any country in the world is what did we contribute to the world? ... we contributed Louis Armstrong"-- Tony Bennett; "If anybody was Mr. Jazz it was Louis Armstrong. He was the epitome of jazz and always will be. He is what I call an American standard, an American original." -- Duke Ellington; "In my opinion, Louis Armstrong is the greatest trumpet stylist of all time and has influenced every trumpet player of his time and long after" -- Al Hirt; "He left an undying testimony to the human condition in the America of his time" -- Wynton Marsalis; "You can't play anything on a horn that Louis hasn't played" -- Miles Davis; "Americans, unknowingly, live part of every day in the house that Satch built"-- noted critic Leonard Feather; "If you don't like Louis Armstrong, you don't know how to love"-- Mahalia Jackson; ".. Armstrong's improvisational verve and technical virtuosity defined jazz ... and his engaging personality and ever-present grin made him a natural as the international ambassador of jazz, America's greatest gift to the world"-- Life Magazine ~ The 100 People Who Made The Millenium; [On The Passing Of Louis Armstrong] --"Mrs. Nixon and I share the sorrow of millions of Americans at the death of Louis Armstrong. One of the architects of an American art form, a free and individual spirit, and an artist of worldwide fame, his great talents and magnificent spirit added richness and pleasure to all our lives."-- President Richard Nixon; "Louis is not dead, for his music is and will remain in the hearts and minds of countless millions of the world's peoples, and in the playing of hundreds of thousands of musicians who have come under his influence."-- Dizzy Gillespie; July 17, 1971; "His memory will be enshrined in the archives of effective international communications. The Department of State, for which he traveled on tours to almost every corner of the globe, mourns the passing of this great American."-- U.S. State Department.