Teaching Company "Elements of Jazz" is excellent

[Laura K (NC)]

I read a review at Amazon which really doesn't do it justice. This would be an awesome course to go along with a modern history course or an American history course. My 14yo son is a pretty good jazz piano player for his age and I got this mainly for him. In my years as a music major I never really got a good education on the history of jazz, and this set of CD's filled the gaps, and related modern jazz to modern classical music. I got a lot out of them, but someone with a less musical background could get a lot out of them as well. The instructor is entertaining and engaging, and gives a lot of references for future study. We listened to the CD's, not the DVD's, and that was really sufficient.

[matroyshka]

Hey, thanks! We're just studying the jazz age - so far I've just taken out CDs of some music. I looked at Ken Burns' Jazz miniseries, but last time I tried Ken Burns on the kids their eyes started to glaze over... but I can ILL the TC audios - if it's that good, it'll be fun to listen to in the car!

[matroyshka]

Hey, I wanted to say thanks again for recommending this! We're on the fourth lecture now, and the kids and I are all loving it! I'm sure I'm learning as much as they are!

Are the rest of the Teaching Company lectures this good? Are there any other particularly fab ones I should look for (especially if I can get them out of the library, like this one?)