A hitchhiker's guide to jazz, from history to modernity, via exceptional performance footage.

The artists who act as torchbearers for the great jazz tradition are custodians of a multicultural miracle. Jazz began as an antidote to pain, with slaves and their descendants gathering in New Orleans around three hundred years ago to express themselves via the music of their mixed heritage.

From these roots, jazz has since grown into an entity that covers much of the world and has, time and time again, enabled people to find solidarity and joy, regardless of the oppression and persecution in-built into their societies.

This playlist provides a snapshot of some of jazz' most eminent practitioners, from yesterday's legends to today's leaders.

The great jazz communicator, Louis Armstrong, features, as does his enduring collaborator, Ella Fitzgerald. Elsewhere, viewers can take in the swing king, Count Basie and the pioneers of the bebop revolution: John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Dizzy Gillespie.

The gods of the jazz piano are present in Herbie Hancock, Bill Evans, Chick Corea, Dave Brubeck, Keith Jarrett, Esbjörn Svensson (the most-sold European jazzman) as well as modern luminaries like Robert Glasper, an artist who blends jazz with hip-hop, funk and international influences, like his bass counterpart, the great Marcus Miller.

Rowan Standish Hayes