[4] Several episodes discussed the later contributions of Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie to bebop, and of Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman, and John Coltrane to free and cool jazz.
The documentary focused on a number of major musicians: Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington are the central figures, "providing the narrative thread around which the stories of other major figures turn",[4] among them Sidney Bechet, Count Basie, Benny Goodman, Billie Holiday, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis and John Coltrane.
"[6] In The New York Times, Ben Ratlife wrote that the program's "major thematic device is effective, and would not come naturally to a music-focused jazz historian.
"[8] Gene Santoro, writing in The Nation, notes, "If Burns had cut the final episode and billed this as Jazz: The First 50 Years, more of the discussion might be where it belongs—on the movie.
"[10] The British newspaper The Guardian wrote, "The series' principal totemic figures, quite rightly, are Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Charlie Parker and Miles Davis.
Since a large proportion of Jazz is devoted to the swing era, two white bandleaders, Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw, are also given prominence—as, later on, is Dave Brubeck.
But even some critics who have spent their lives arguing for a proper recognition of jazz's African-American essence believe that Burns—with the encouragement of Marsalis, Crouch and Murray—has pushed the Afrocentric line so far that the refusal to give credit to the contribution of white musicians undermines the series' historical accuracy.
"[11] Professor emeritus Frank Tirro wrote, "He gives, as one example, Louis Armstrong's 'West End Blues' as 'a reflection of the country in the moments before the Great Depression.'