This episode focuses on the origins of jazz, and more specifically the music of the South that led to the creation of the genre. The program identifies the influences of Black southern musical tradition in the form of spirituals, the blues, and gospel, and explains how those elements fused into the genre of jazz at the time. The program focuses more specifically on New Orleans style jazz and the origins of the genre in that region. The program also features the music of prominent artists in these different genres from the private collection of George Avakian, including Johnny Dodds, The Mitchell Christian Singers, Sonny Terry, Bessie Smith, Louis Armstrong, Kidd Jordan, Kid Ory, and Louis Dumaine.

Series Description: "This program is prepared as the 'home work' for classes in NYU's 'Basic Jazz Course' taught weekly by two qualified instructors, one of [whom] prepares the radio scripts. The series of programs and the course it illustrates present jazz in an artistic and cultural light, with each program a separate musical and historical unit within itself. The music played is on actual period recordings, most of them collector's items."--1948 Peabody Awards entry form.

WNYC archives id: 152601