Since its transformation in 1934 from a "whites only" burlesque theater to a showplace of African American music, dance, and comedy, the Apollo Theater has exerted an unprecedented influence upon American popular culture. Jazz, Jump, and Jive traces the history of the Apollo Theater, charting the rise and fall of musical and entertainment genres featured at the Apollo as they intersect with larger social and political issues within the Harlem community and the nation. Jazz, Jump, and Jive brims with stories and photographs of famous entertainers who performed there--Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Dizzy Gillespie, Sarah Vaughn, Smokey Robinson, Aretha Franklin, The Supremes, James Brown, The Jackson Five, Redd Foxx, and Honi Coles to name a few--in addition to objects and ephemera related to the performers and the theater and its owners. Jazz, Jump, and Jive brings into high relief the ebb and flow of African American entertainment, and highlights the developments that indisputably shaped the contour of American culture.
