Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture > Collections > Moving Image and Recorded Sound Division

CBS Television Recording

On Wednesday, 4 December 1957, Columbia Records documented one of the most important jazz recordings in the history of the music ("The Sound of Jazz"/CS-8040) with an all-star cast from various record labels. On Sunday, 8 December 1957, in what remains perhaps the most important jazz event in television history, CBS television aired a live broadcast, including most of the musicians from the recording session, as they performed the same music in a recording studio environment. Shown here are (l-r) Billie Holiday, Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins and Gerry Mulligan.