Could Louis Armstrong read music?

Yes. Louis first learned to read music in the Waif’s Home at about age twelve. When he joined the Fate Marable Band as a teenager, he greatly improved his reading. (The Marable Band was the first band that Louis was in that used written arrangements.) While performing at the Vendome Theater with the Erskine Tate Orchestra in the late 1920s, he was required to sight read difficult trumpet parts. The concept of a jazz musician who improvises virtuosic solos but who cannot read music is somewhat of a myth. Most jazz musicians have a tremendous command of music theory and are skilled readers.