Pianist Joe Sullivan was a noted performer in Chicago, New York and San Francisco jazz circles. These rare recordings feature a string of buoyant solos, but he also joins Sidney Bechet, Pops Foster and George Wettling for an up-tempo combo and accompanies vocalist Stella Brooks in "Rabbit Foot Blues. "

There is no single kind of music that led to the creation of Jazz. Instead, the genre evolved, and continues to evolve, from diverse musical avenues. Following the popularity of swing music in the 1930's, Boogie Woogie-with it's characteristic walking bass pattern-captivated audiences and dancers. Performed by pianists like Count Basie and Meade Lux Lewis, this exciting rhythm provides-as Basie said-"four heavy beats to a bar, and no cheating."

This album presents a variety of blues, and in Brownie McGhee's singing are echoes of work and dance songs, as well as spirituals. Brownie himself once said, "I want to make music the way I know is real," and the blues on this collection exemplify his honest, powerful style.

Speckled Red (Rufus Perryman, 1892-1973) was one of the most irrepressible and enthusiastic proponents of barrel-house piano, a style born of rowdy roadhouses and closely associated with boogie-woogie but louder and more raucous. Red-born in Georgia and well traveled-was a self-taught player, never letting the finer points of the correct chord interfere with his own enthusiasm for the music. This collection of originals, Red's only collection on Folkways, showcases his singing and rhythmic approach to the keyboard. Red provides introductions to most of his tunes, offering further insight into the artist. The liner notes further explain the nuances of barrel-house piano.

Walter E. "Furry" Lewis (1893-1981), was a Mississippi-born, Memphis-bred guitarist and singer whose early fame was based on his 1927 recordings for the Victor label. When the Depression ended most of the recording in the South, Furry took a job as a laborer for the city of Memphis. He lived in musical obscurity until he was "re-discovered" by producer Sam Charters in the late 1950s. Lewis's version of "John Henry" is a powerful example of early southern blues. This collection also includes Lewis's oral history of his early days as a bluesman, as well as the story of his musical education in several styles of blues guitar. The liner notes include a discography of Lewis's early recordings.

This fascinating album of storytelling and music includes some of minstrel, composer, businessman, and bluesman Perry Bradford's best-known works, including "That Thing Called Love," the first song ever recorded by Mamie Smith for Okeh Records in 1920. Singer Noble Sissle's interview with Bradford provides narration for this selection of songs.

An influential figure in the growth of the Southern blues tradition, William "Jazz" Gillum (1904-1966) had the kind of life from which the blues spring. Orphaned, starved, threatened, shot at, beaten, and discriminated against, Gillum's style, as heard throughout this recording-and as described in the liner notes-is unsurprisingly "sometimes harsh, sometimes poetic, with it's expressive delayed beat and strong rhythm, and it's bitterness tinged with nostalgia." He is joined on this album by Arbee Stidham (vocals and guitar) and Memphis Slim (organ and piano), associates from his early professional jobs in Chicago in the 1930s. Liner notes include song lyrics and a biography of Gillum, who lived and sang the blues his whole life.

At the time his music was recorded in 1952, highly-respected trumpet player Kid Clayton was somewhat elusive, playing with pick-up marching bands but with no steady ensemble. After some effort, composer and jazz aficionado Alden Ashforth arranged a recording session, which features Clayton's buoyant trumpet playing alongside a host of skilled musicians, including Joe "Kid" Avery on trombone.

This double set brings together thirty-five sides recorded by Mary Lou Williams for Moses Asch between 1944 and 1947. Twenty-eight of these songs were previously only released on 78 rpm, and this collection includes solo and trio performances, as well as small-group and big band recordings.

This fascinating album follows jazz drummer Baby Dodd's as he demonstrates the sonic elements of his famous solos and discusses these component parts with the attentive audience. From a discussion of drumming in the 1920s to a tom-tom "workout," Dodd's' album is as entertaining as it is educational.

This compilation remembers the early days of jazz, when Buddy Bolden's band started playing it's iconoclastic arrangements of new songs. Recorded interviews join instrumental rags and cabaret music in this sonic snapshot of New Orleans history.

So versatile that she was able to sustain a professional career for more than thirty years, jazz pianist, composer and arranger Mary Lou Williams ran the gamut from Dixieland to swing, bop and avant-garde. This album is among her 1960s avant-garde works, with intimate piano combos and vocal jazz choruses; it includes her well-known cantata, The Black Christ of the Andes (also available remastered and reissued on SFW40816 as a CD, complete with extensive liner notes and historic photos).

The list of musicians trumpet player Bunny Berigan and trombonist Jack Teagarden played with in the 1930s includes a vast array of jazz performers, from Tommy Dorsey to Louis Armstrong. Both musicians were equally at home with large and small ensembles, and this fine recording reflects their flexibility and musicianship.

After rediscovering a tin box full of acetate recordings of jazz rehearsal sessions, Folkways founder Moe Asch pieced together a sequence that shows the on-the-spot creative energy musicians produce in the studio. This disc features Mary Lou Williams and her hand-picked group of session musicians, all innovators from the clubs of New York.