'Uptown Conversation' asserts that jazz is not only a music to define, it is a culture. The essays illustrate how for more than a century jazz has initiated a call and response across art forms, geographies, and cultures, inspiring musicians, filmmakers,painters and poets.

This text explores the influence of jazz and blues in two key areas of cultural expression, literature and film, where these musics have often been inextricably linked with notions of racial identity and self-representation.

The most comprehensive guide to jazz and blues recordings in print, including reviews of more than ten thousand albums. An essential book for any music fan's library.

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Equal parts autobiography and imagination, Charleston, S.C., native Louis D. Rubin captures the atmosphere of the city during the Great Depression and the onset of World War II.