Extraordinary music that is the soundtrack of the 20th century in America

Ken Burns

Now the series is coming to Britain.

Burns, previously celebrated in the USA for two epic documentary series, Baseball and The Civil War, freely admits to having been a jazz novice when he took on the project.

Ken Burns is a noted documentary maker

He now calls jazz "the only art form that Americans have contributed" to the world.

Working closely with jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis, Burns assembled miles of archive film, thousands of still photographs and 75 interviews.

Race

He has placed the development of the music firmly in the social and historical milieu from which it emerged - black America.

"By tackling jazz one tackles many more things than the extraordinary music that is the soundtrack of the 20th Century in America," Burns told the BBC.

"You tackle a whole range of American themes, not the least of which is race.

"How ironic that the people most responsible for founding the only art form that Americans have invented are people who have a historical memory of being unfree in a supposedly free land."

Jazz's first international star, Louis Armstrong

In the series Burns champions the genius of jazz's first international star, trumpeter Louis Armstrong.

"He's the most important person in American music in the 20th Century.

"He single-handedly transformed jazz from an ensemble music to a soloist's art, inventing modern time - 'swing' - this quantum leap in the way people played notes."

But amidst the praise for Burns have come criticisms.

Some say that, while rightly celebrating the genius of jazz's black American originators, the series has ignored the role of some important white musicians.

Open letter

And there is also the fact that the series spends little time on jazz after 1961 - virtually the whole second half of the music's history.

Pianist Keith Jarrett - widely seen as one of jazz's greatest living keyboardists - wrote an open letter to the New York Times in which he lamented "the socioeconomic racial forensics of a jazz-illiterate historian".

He asked for "some films about jazz by people who actually know and understand the music itself and are willing to deal comprehensively with the last 40 years."

British trumpeter and jazz historian Ian Carr takes a more measured view.

"It's certainly a Wynton Marsalis view of jazz history," he told BBC NewsOnline, "but it's creating so much interest in jazz that if it's really successful, the things that haven't been covered will be covered by someone else.

Charlie Parker's genius is analysed in the series

"You can't leave people like Keith Jarrett out - he's one of the greatest - and at some point this balance has to be redressed."

But Carr is delighted by the series' analysis of Louis Armstrong: "Armstrong never got his real due - he was a real genius and he transformed 20th century music.

"So this perspective might restore the right balance for Armstrong, who was seen by many as a clown.

"I'm glad this film's been done - the historical balance may not be right, but anything that raises the profile of this wonderful music is good."

And for those who want to hear more of the bands they see in the show, the marketing men have thought of everything.

The series launches amid an unusual unified effort by two music majors - Universal's Verve Music Group and Sony's Columbia/Legacy - to market a whole series of associated jazz albums.

Jazz starts on BBC Two on Saturday 9 June at 1930 BST