In the centenary of jazz ­the Darmstadt Jazzforum conference in 2017 looked at the pitfalls of jazz historiography, which often relies on myths and legends that distort what is even more important: the multi-perspectivity of a music which is being created not only by great masters, but certainly by many individualists.

The fifteen essays in this book try to shift our perspectives on people, places and styles. They focus on what we think we know about jazz in order to question the same knowledge and make us aware both of the ways in which our understanding of the music, its history and its aesthetic has been shaped, and of how that understanding continues to change to this day.