The Age Of Jazz

One hundred years ago a group of American musicians docked in London, bringing with them for the very first time one of the twentieth century’s most important musical genres: jazz, a fascinating blend of rigorous structure, free-wheeling creativity, close-knit ensemble work and improvisation.

Drawing on his practical experience both as musicologist and gigging musician, Sandy Burnett is able to shed light on jazz from the inside. His talk touches on the disparate influences which lay behind the emergence of jazz, with musical illustrations ranging from the blues, ragtime and the very earliest jazz recordings through to classics by Louis Armstrong’s Hot Five and the Duke Ellington Orchestra, and the dawn of the Swing Era.