[1] He received early instruction on the violin from his father Nathan who was concertmaster for Arturo Toscanini's NBC Symphony Orchestra.
He was editor of the journal Metronome from 1943 to 1955 and increased its coverage of modern jazz music as well as promoting contemporary African American musicians.
In the early 1950s, as part of a Metronome sponsored event, he ran The New Jazz Society which met at a West 54th Street club where Charlie Parker occupied the weekend residency.
[citation needed] He promoted the idea that the entertainment media should be more Christian in nature, taking to task the movies, music, plays, and particularly comic books (which he called the worst product of the press) in the 1950s.
[10] The Annual Barry Ulanov Memorial Lecture Series is held each year at the Union Theological Seminary.
In an essay that appeared in her book Civil Wars, Jordan described with nostalgic admiration a surprise in-class exam administered by Ulanov.