JAZZ begins in New Orleans, nineteenth century America's most cosmopolitan city, where the sound of marching bands, Italian opera, Caribbean rhythms, and minstrel shows fills the streets with a richly diverse musical culture. Here, in the 1890s, African-American musicians create a new music out of these ingredients by mixing in ragtime syncopations and the soulful feeling of the blues.
During the Sixties, jazz is in trouble.
Currents of change in American now impact Jazz.
The postwar years bring America to a level of prosperity unimaginable a decade before.
