The suite makes use of elements of classical music alongside jazz, and Williams was influenced by modernism when writing and arranging it.

[4] Scholar Richard Thompson noted the wide variance of styles in the suite, which included "20th century European piano preludes, blues boogie-woogie, vamps, ABA sectional forms, which often contrast jazz and classical writing, free piano cadenzas, standard song progressions and forms.

"[6] Jazz scholar Mark Tucker proposed that the suite is "part of a larger stream of American composition" which encompasses the work of Paul Whiteman, Ferde Grofé, Peter DeRose, Alec Wilder, Bix Beiderbecke and Willard Robison.

[8] Williams had hoped to finish the suite for a live performance on the radio station WNEW in 1945 with Al Lucas on bass and Jack Parker on drums.

[13][14] "Aries" was for Ben Webster and Billie Holiday; "Taurus" for Duke Ellington; "Gemini" for Shorty Baker; "Cancer" for Lem Davis; "Leo" for Vic Dickenson; "Libra" for Art Tatum, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker and John Coltrane; "Scorpio" for Ethel Waters, Katherine Dunham and Al Lucas; "Sagittarius" for Eddie Heywood; "Capricorn" for Pearl Primus and Frankie Newton; "Aquarius" for Josh White and Eartha Kitt; and "Pisces" for Al Hall and Barney Josephson.

Williams' piano playing lacked its usual vibrancy, and Orent, who was conducting, lost a page of music which confused the musicians.

[23][24] Journalist Chris Albertson noted that Rosenkrantz released music from Zodiac Suite on the Selmer record label using different song titles.

[26] In June 1946, Williams performed Zodiac Suite with a 70-member symphony orchestra at New York's Carnegie Hall after being approached by the concert promoter Norman Granz.

However, the string section performed poorly, and, according to William's biographer Linda Dahl, the suite "collapsed under the weight of a full orchestra".

[31] Williams performed parts of Zodiac Suite with a trio in 1947 for an National Association for the Advancement of Colored People benefit concert at Syracuse University.

[32] She had initially been invited by a Syracuse student to perform a symphonic version of the suite, but her fee for this was too high for the university's budget.

[33] In 1957, she performed with the trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie at the Newport Jazz Festival a medley of three songs from the suite ("Virgo", "Libre" and "Aries") that was included on an album of the concert.

[39][40][41] In 2021, Zodiac Suite was performed by the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Tito Muñoz, and by the Kansas City Jazz Orchestra.

[9][44] The work's symphonic nature makes it a precursor to the third stream genre which combines jazz and classical music.

[1][44] Ben Ratliff called Zodiac Suite "beautifully coherent" and noted the strong feminine expression in the "unmacho" music.

[48][47] In his review of the reissue of the album, Tucker wrote that the recording highlights Williams's ability "not just as composer but as improviser".

Paul Bowles described the performance as "neither fish nor foul" in its attempt to marry American jazz and French impressionism.