This classic study of jazz by renowned composer conductor & musical scholar Gunther Schuller was widely acclaimed on its first publication in 1968. The first of two volumes on the history & musical contribution of jazz it takes us from the beginnings of jazz as a distinct musical style at the turn of the century to its first great flowering in the 1930s. Schuller explores the music of the great jazz soloists of the twenties--Jelly Roll Morton Bix Beiderbecke Bessie Smith Louis Armstrong & others--and the big bands & arrangers--Fletcher Henderson Bennie Moten & especially Duke Ellington--placing their music in the context of the other musical cultures & languages of the 20th century & offering original analyses of many great jazz recordings. Now reissued in paper Early Jazz provides a musical tour of the early American jazz world for a new generation of scholars students & jazz fans.