Covers more than eighteen thousand recordings and more than 1,700 musicians from across the jazz spectrum and includes a history of the different types of jazz, the evolution of jazz instruments, and essays on styles.

The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings is firmly established as the world's leading guide to recorded jazz, a mine of fascinating information and a source of insightful - often wittily trenchant - criticism. This is something rather different: Brian Morton (who taught American history at UEA) has picked out the 1000 best recordings that all jazz fans should have and shows how they tell the history of the music and with it the history of the twentieth century. He has completely revised his and Richard Cook's entries and reassessed each artist's entry for this book. The result is an endlessly browsable companion that will prove required reading for aficionados and jazz novices alike. 'It's the kind of book that you'll yank off the shelf to look up a quick fact and still be reading two hours later' Fortune 'Part jazz history, part jazz Karma Sutra with Cook and Morton as the knowledgeable, urbane, wise and witty guides ... This is one of the great books of recorded jazz; the other guides don't come close' Irish Times

It is St. Louis in 1919. The central character is Liz, a youngish, gutsy, widowed woman faced with selling the family farm to pay debts. With her are her four daughters, one dying of tuberculosis, one who's married into a society family, another who's a blooming activist and the youngest on the brink of discovering sex and losing her innocence in general. As the play unfolds, it's apparent that 1919 is a watershed year in America's history. There are hints of the country heading uncertainly towards a new and different way of life. But essentially, it is about the social and psychological state of women and the painful solitude imposed by that state. Then at the end, a telegram arrives stating that the family's only son has died, a victim of one of war's side effects.

An indispensable reference source since 1964, providing detailed information on virtually every economic, legal and financial aspect of the complex music buiness.