The Jazz Ambassadors

The untold story of America's coolest weapon in the Cold War

  • Rated 7.0 out of 10
  • Movie
  • 2018
  • 1h 0m
  • Documentary

The Cold War and Civil Rights collide in this remarkable story of music, diplomacy and race. Beginning in 1955, when America asked its greatest jazz artists to travel the world as cultural ambassadors, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington and their mixed-race band members, faced a painful dilemma: how could they represent a country that still practiced Jim Crow segregation?

Play
Director
Hugo Berkeley
Starring
Leslie Odom Jr., Quincy Jones, Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong

Cast

  • Leslie Odom Jr.

    Leslie Odom Jr.

    Narrator

  • Quincy Jones

    Quincy Jones

    Self

  • Dizzy Gillespie

    Dizzy Gillespie

    Self (archive footage)

  • Louis Armstrong

    Louis Armstrong

    Self (archive footage)

  • Darius Brubeck

    Self

  • Bill Crow

    Self

  • Duke Ellington

    Duke Ellington

    Self (archive footage)

  • Charlie Persip

    Self

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