Narrator
Keith David
Harry Connick Jr.
(archive footage)
Sidney Bechet
Eric George
(archive footage)
Louis Armstrong
Samuel L. Jackson
(archive footage)
Duke Ellington
(archive footage)
Benny Goodman
Courtney B. Vance
Ann Duquesnay
(archive footage)
Artie Shaw
Philip Bosco
(archive footage)
Billie Holiday
Kevin Conway
(archive footage)
Glenn Miller
(archive footage)
Dave Brubeck
Cherry Jones
Joe Morton
(archive footage)
Art Tatum
Delroy Lindo
(archive footage)
John Coltrane
Adam Arkin
(archive footage)
Art Blakey
Matthew Broderick
(archive footage)
Charles Mingus
James Naughton
Commentator
Wynton Marsalis
(archive footage)
Miles Davis
(archive footage)
Lester Young