As the twentieth century drew to a close, jazz music celebrated one hundred years of innovation and experimentation. A complex genre of music, jazz has developed rapidly and in many directions since the combination of ragtime and blues music played with syncopation was labelled "jazz", allegedly in a turn-of-the-century New Orleans.

In celebration of the first hundred years of jazz, Icons Of Jazz presents a selection of representatives from all aspects of the genre: the New Orleans and Dixieland of the first two decades of the 20th century; the swing and jump jive of the 1920s and 1930s; bebop and its legacy of the 1940s and 1950s; the free jazz of the 1960s; jazz-rock from the 1970s; and the melting pot that was jazz in the 1980s and throughout the 1990s. Each entry includes details of the life and work of the artists or band concerned, recommends essential records, and is illustrated with stunning black-and-white photographs.

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