[3] Through the use of live music performance, narration, autobiographies, historical recordings and musical demonstrations, the series focuses on jazz from before World War II as played by the great pioneers such as Jelly Roll Morton, Joe "King" Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, Sidney Bechet, Duke Ellington, Fletcher Henderson and many more.

Also featured are the lives and music of the great interwar pop composers such as George and Ira Gershwin, Rodgers and Hart, Harry Warren, Harold Arlen, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern and many others.

Frequent guests include playwright and actor Vernel Bagneris, pianist Dick Hyman, vocalists Topsy Chapman and Nina Ferro, and cornetist Bob Barnard, as well as guest bands such as the Hot Club of San Francisco.

Other notable musical guests in past years have included Benny Carter, Linda Hopkins, Bob Wilber, Bob Haggart, Yank Lawson, Kenny Davern, Harry "Sweets" Edison, Clark Terry, Bucky Pizzarelli, John Pizzarelli, Banu Gibson, Rebecca Kilgore, Ralph Sutton, Ken Peplowski, Doc Cheatham, Savion Glover, Milt Hinton, Jay McShann, Joe Williams, Shelly Berg, Catherine Russell, Bob Havens, Carol Woods, Harry Allen, Howard Alden.

Marty Grosz, Lionel Hampton, Vince Giordano, Warren Vaché, Jr., and William Warfield.