Photo: Louis Armstrong, Courtesy of Frank Driggs Collection
 
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Jazz is a ten part series that explores the evolution – and the genius – of America’s greatest original art form, focusing on the extraordinary men and women who could do something remarkable – create art on the spot. Jazz celebrates their profoundly enduring, endlessly varied, and infinitely alluring music in the context of the complicated country that gave birth to and influenced it, and was in turn transformed by it. The series offers complex and engaging portraits of many of the greatest figures in jazz – among them Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Bix Beiderbecke, Fletcher Henderson, Charlie Parker, Sarah Vaughan, Count Basie, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, John Coltrane and Miles Davis.

Jazz is about much more than the evolution of the music alone. The film is about sex and romance, and the rituals of courtship in America; it is about joy and celebration, and having a good time; it is about our greatest cities and the people who migrated to them; it is about the rise of records, radio, and television. Jazz is about minstrelsy and lynching, and the struggle for civil rights. It is about the sufferings of the Great Depression, and the sacrifices our nation made in two world wars. It is also a story about drugs and dissipation and pain – and the life-affirming art that comes out of it all.

A Film By
KEN BURNS

Written By
GEOFFREY C. WARD

Produced By
KEN BURNS
LYNN NOVICK

Co-Producers
PETER MILLER
VICTORIA GOHL

Edited By
PAUL BARNES
SANDRA MARIE CHRISTIE
LEWIS ERSKINE
ERIK EWERS
SARAH E. HILL
CRAIG MELLISH
SHANNON ROBARDS
TRICIA REIDY
AARON VEGA

Cinematography
BUDDY SQUIRES
KEN BURNS

Narrated By
KEITH DAVID

Funding Provided By
General Motors Corporation
Public Broadcasting Service
The Park Foundation
Corporation for Public Broadcasting
The PEW Charitable Trusts
Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism
Doris Duke Charitable Foundation
The National Endowment for the Humanities
The Arthur Vining Davis Foundations
The Reva and David Logan Foundation
The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
The National Endowment for the Arts
Helen and Peter Bing

Access more credits

Original Broadcast January 2001

Film Honors:
• Telluride Film Festival, 2000
• Festival International de Programmes Audovisuels, Paris, January 2001
• Nominated, Banff Rockie Award, 2001
• 2001 Television Critics Association Award, Outstanding Achievement, News & Information
• 2001 Emmy Nominations:
       Outstanding Non-Fiction Series
       Outstanding Picture Editing for Non-Fiction Programming
       Outstanding Cinematography for Non-Fiction Programming
       Outstanding Sound Editing for Non-Fiction Programming
       Outstanding Sound Mixing for Non-Fiction Programming
• Winner of ASCAP Deems Taylor Award, 2001
• Five CD Soundtrack, Platinum, 2001
• Booklist, Editor’s Choice, Best of 2001
• Leon Award, Best Documentary, St. Louis Film Festival, 2001
• ASCAP President’s Award, Outstanding Television Documentary, 2001
• The New York Times, The Year in Television, #2 Critics’ Choice
• Christopher Award, 2001
• Best of Television, 2001, People Magazine
• CINE Golden Eagle Award, 2002

 
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