(bright instrumental music) - On May 25th, 1977, the Spoleto Festival of Two Worlds embarked on a new phase of its cultural odyssey, the right here in Charleston, South Carolina.

- One of the parts of Menotti's genius was that what we have here isn't just a series of important artistic offerings.

And that alone would be very nice.

(band playing) What is created is an atmosphere.

It's a celebration where the spirit and the energy of the arts is all around you.

Let the dancers dance, the choirs sing, the children play, the acrobats and the trees perform.

I hereby declare the Spoleto Festival USA has begun.

- This year, the Spoleto Festival USA celebrates its 25th anniversary.

Hello, I'm Beryl Dakers.

Tonight we continue our look back at the Spoleto Festival and its history.

It would be literally impossible to chronicle all the significant moments for Spoleto, but through the limited video archives available to us, in our last program we did sample opera, music theater, drama, and dance.

Tonight, we turn our attention to music: the Westminster Choir, the Festival Orchestra, that daily staple chamber music, the visual arts, and of course, jazz.

(spirited violin music) - I feel a mission to try to get chamber music to as many people as I can, and to remove prejudices that people have about chamber music.

It's a form of music which is open to everyone.

You don't have to have a special background, or you don't have to be terribly sophisticated to enjoy it, and that's what I've been trying to get over for all these years.

(spirited violin music) - Historic Dock Street theater is home for yet another Spoleto treasure: the daily chamber music concerts.

Eager crowds gather at 11:00 a.m. and again at 1:00 PM for a previously unannounced program, and generally, they're standing room only.

What accounts for the incredible success of this series?

Well, I'd have to say, number one, the humorous wit and integrity of host and founder, Charles Wadsworth; two, the daring virtuosity displayed by these amazingly talented young performers; and, three, did I mention the music?

(passionate orchestral music) - For me, it was quite wonderful in that he did take a chance, because I had had really no experience in chamber music.

He was taking a chance giving me such a large responsibility.

But once having done that, he left me alone with it.

He trusted me, trusted my instinct.

He has a feeling for people and what they may be able to do.

- With young artists, you have to take a chance, buy, you know, my Italian nose is very long, and it's like an antenna, and that's the way you have to look for talent.

You just have to smell around, like people who are wine connoisseurs.

You have to really... to have an instinct about where to find talent.

(singing in foreign language) - [Joseph] The chamber music opening and Barbara Hendricks, a beautiful African American woman came on that stage at the Dock Street Theater, and her voice brought tears to the eyes of everybody there and goosebumps on the arms.

- I was very excited by the response that first year.

We still hadn't been accepted in Charleston.

It was a very different feeling from that standpoint, in that we had to sway the city.

A lot of people in that town were not sure that they wanted us there, these interlopers, all these artsy types coming in there.

But there were some key people with the city, like Joe Riley, of course, and so many people that did want to see it succeed, and there are a few in the old guard who were willing to go along with the idea.

(playing flute) - I love playing chamber music, because it does combine a great amount of personal thought and an opportunity for a personal statement about the music.

This is something which has always been very important to me in my musical life.

I've thought a great deal about the music I play, and it's important to me to have those thoughts that be able to express them freely.

On the other hand, I've always loved working with other human beings and the interchange between minds, brains, and souls of other musicians.

And so to me, that's why I find chamber music so exciting, because it does combine those things.

It combines a high level of individuality with a real interchange of ideas.

- [Beryl] Violist Scott Nickrenz and his flutist wife, Paula Robison, served as co-directors of the chamber music series.

- We keep coming back to this idea of being cooks, making up menus.

I hate to always talk in those terms, but you think of a piece.

Now, that would be a certain dish, like a casserole, all right?

(Paula chuckles) And then we really want to present this casserole.

So that would be of, say, a Mendelssohn sextet.

And then we say, well, okay, now what are the ingredients gonna be?

So, not to be corny, but this idea of preparing menus and getting the right ingredients is a great correlation here.

(light chamber music) - I think that the Spoleto Festival, when it's looked back, when we look back or when those who come after us look back, will emerge as one of are really important artistic movements of the 20th century.

I really think so, because the kind of spirit, the kind of community of artists that this festival has, that it had in Spoleto when it started, that it's carried here, that it will carry wherever it goes around the world, is something really unique.

It's a marvelous thing, marvelous phenomenon, 20th century phenomenon.

(light chamber music) (light chamber music) - [Beryl] Largely due to the phenomenal popularity of the soundtrack from "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", Yo Yo Ma is now perhaps the world's best-known cellist.

His amazing solo career has been a novel success story, yet Yo Yo, along with a host of others, must credit Spoleto with providing his first real thrust into the limelight.

What about Yo Yo, that first season, when you heard him.

Did you have any idea that he would be the Yo Yo Ma that we know today?

- It didn't really occur to me, because I wasn't thinking of these people as becoming stars, because they were chamber musicians.

And I didn't have the imagination, myself, to see it.

I do remember writing about him, his flamboyance and play.

We always hear about the inscrutable Orientals, and I called him the scrutable Mr. Ma, because when he played, you could just see everything in his face.

He was so vital.

And he was up there emoting all over the place.

Love and hate and despair and joy and everything, it was right there in front of you.

(passionate chamber music) - These young people we bring in have... a lot of joy as people, and a lot of humor, because that's what we really encourage.

And with this humor and joy and love of life, if we rehearse and play in the right way, this is gonna come across the footlights when they go on stage and play for our wonderful audiences here.

(passionate chamber music) - Schumann, more than almost anybody that I can think of, seemed to have access to really secret places in peoples' souls, right.

(background chatter) - When he's at his best, as he is in this piece, he can go right to those secret places, and he writes music of such incredibly intense emotive power, it's extraordinary.

(moving chamber music) (musicians chuckling) - [Beryl] Perhaps more than any one thing, it is Wadsworth's easygoing informality that makes these concerts such a delight.

- Us little first graders, my class made up a little song we would sing going to school every day, which was "Maggie brown went to town with her britches hanging down."

(audience laughing) She would make us in the morning, first thing, or rather second thing after the prayer, the pledge to allegiance, she would make us do the Roman numerals out loud, standing up.

Very, very important in our education to know the Roman numerals.

I don't know why, except to tell when a movie was released.

(audience laughing) I can't figure it out.

But anyway, to hear 40 little kids say at the top of their voices in Southern accents, doing this.

I one, II two, III three, IV four, V five, VI six, VII seven, VIII eight, IX nine, X 10, XI, and so forth.

(audience laughing) Okay.

- Charles is like the father of chamber music.

He puts us all together.

He's just great.

He works with us quite well.

(spirited chamber music) - [Beryl] A crowd favorite, the St. Lawrence string quartet, defies the image of the traditional, stodgy chamber foursome.

(fevered chamber music) - As a stringer quartet, one of the great things about it is all the great composers, for the most part, wrote great music for string quartet.

They realized that was the ultimate.

I mean, look at late Beethoven, who wrote these five quartets which are sort of the summit of Western music in many ways.

And Hayden and Mozart, everybody.

So, composers through the centuries have recognized this, quartet is, in many ways, the perfect medium.

(light chamber music) The one thing I think we try to do is we're doing this for fun.

We love the music music, and that's all you can do.

The minute you stop loving the music, it's time to pack it in.

- [Beryl] Nonetheless, you can always count on the dignity of a chamber work.

Or can you?

(musicians shouting and playing) - Schafer is a great Canadian composer.

He wrote in the score, in the second movement, where we're yelling and screaming and it's all based on Inuit chanting, he writes, "Must be play with maximum physical energy throughout."

(playing cello) - [Alban] Everybody is a soloist, and everybody has different, strong opinions.

So sometimes this comes to nice clashes.

(exciting chamber music) The joy is it's the greatest music written, the chamber music.

- I think they love Charles down here.

(chuckles) - Yeah.

- And I can see why.

He just keeps everything very lively, very bright, very happy situation, no matter how stressful it might get with all the rehearsals, all the performances.

He always manages to keep everything under control and still have fun with it and make people happy.

- And he's a very good musician, so we trust his advice.

- Well, you know, I've been out there ever since my earliest days of doing this.

This is my 42nd year with the festival, consecutive.

And of course, as an artist, I can't allow myself to play down to any audience.

And I'm convinced that, if you place a very difficult work in the right way, in the context of the whole program, then people will put up with a difficult work sometimes that they can't understand, because they know they've got 15 minutes, they can handle that until they get to that beautiful Mendelssohn trio.

So, you get your captive audience in there, and you give them some... Amazingly, if people are relaxed enough, they can enjoy it.

I am convinced that you don't have to know anything in order to love a great performance of a great piece of music.

(playing harp) - Well, Spoleto has kept my faith in music and the whole business of classical music, which can be rather...

It can be sort of miserable at times, 'cause we're doing this 'cause we love it, but you have to earn a living.

So, to come somewhere like here, where it's an incredible combination that Charles has brought in all these great musicians who we love and we're friends with.

There's this incredible hall.

The audiences are warm and they love music, and they're there because they love music.

And the festival itself is sort of thriving, and there's this incredible artistic buzz in the air, with dance and jazz and everything going on.

And you get paid.

I mean, it's amazing.

And you're treated incredibly well.

So we look forward to this every year, and it really keeps us... You think, well, this is the way it should be.

This is what really makes what we do, all the work, really worthwhile.

(audience applauding) (singing in foreign language) - [Beryl] Music is omnipresent at Spoleto.

Two supporting arms, the Festival Orchestra and the Westminster Choir, which serves as the official resident chorus, provide the backbone around which many events are built.

The talented musicians comprising the 100-member orchestra are all recruited from around the country and handpicked by the orchestral director.

(passionate choral music) In its first quarter century, the music director's chair for Spoleto USA has been filled by a succession of very talented young conductors.

- Really give it to me there.

105, please.

And one!

(feverish orchestral music) - To fill three clarinet positions I heard 47 clarinets.

You can see that we actually have the opportunity to have the real cream of the crop of young American musical talent, which at this point in our musical history is probably the highest in the world.

(emphatic orchestral music) Our kids are the best prepared.

They have the greatest stamina.

The thing that I find so incredible is that, although we work them hard, many people think too hard, at the end of the day, when they've played an opera in the afternoon and a ballet in the evening, you walk by a courtyard or the dormitories and what are they doing?

They're playing chamber music and string quartets, so that's the kind of enthusiasm and whole-scale dedication to music which makes the festival possible at all.

(intriguing orchestral music) - Another for whom the festival has meant much is Musical director Christian Badea, who works with Menotti in selecting the program, auditions the orchestra and conducts the major performances.

- It was also an opportunity, by being music director, to try to do something with my own hands from beginning to the end, programming the makeup of the orchestra, the conducting.

So it was a very challenging and very complete endeavor.

And I didn't hesitate one second when Gian Carlo Menotti offered it.

- [Beryl] The year 1993 marked the official debut of Steven Mercurio as music director for the Spoleto Festivals.

Mercurio, who also served as principal conductor of the Opera Company of Philadelphia, made his European debut in 1991, conducting Menotti's "Goya" at the Festival of Two Worlds.

- I think you have to be a little unstable to be a composer.

It's part of what makes the genius come out is looking through the world with a different set of eyes, and that that's associated with being a child, I think, more than anything else.

It's a strange paradox between the seriousness of classical music versus what it really takes to create it or to do it.

Composers want to move audiences, and whether they cheer or cry or scream or whatever it is, they write to move people, and I enjoy that.

I enjoy being like the wizard of Oz behind the curtain there.

- [Beryl] A gifted composer in his own right, Mercurio's "For Lost Loved Ones" was given its world premiere by Zubin Mehta and the New York Philharmonic.

(soft orchestral music) (imposing orchestral music) - I can say that the orchestra's been very inspiring for me as an artist.

I often work with professionals, not ones that are so young, and it's exhilarating to work with people who have such a great attitude about what they do and really hold the level of what they do in the highest regard, and also a great human ambition and enthusiasm about it.

(soft orchestral music) Never was it my intent to have a piece like this... be a final swan song or something like that.

But I am pleased, actually that it is... just by circumstance, that the final concert I am doing in my 10 years as music record is, in fact, a piece of this nature, because I think it signifies a lot of what I've tried to do in the festival and to bring new music, bring interesting ideas, break the mold, stretch our imagination, and I hope that in, in some way, this has been an example of that.

Everything about my Spoleto experience has been the most positive that I can imagine.

It's been a joy to work here.

It's been a privilege and an honor.

- So when these kids come and they look at me with innocence, I can't fool around with them.

This is another big responsibility towards the orchestra.

I have to give them the best I have, because they're giving the best that they have without trying to fake anything.

Even with, with the Rosenkavalier, even with the Allegro, all these pieces I've done in Spoleto, I hear things which I never heard with the philharmonic, because they don't know really how to fake.

They play everything the way it's written.

So all of a sudden, the score sounds different, and that is what everybody says, "The orchestra is amazing."

Yes.

First of all, American musicians, one, they're excellent.

(soft orchestral music) We should never be afraid of the innovation.

We should never be afraid of the public.

The public is too intelligent to underestimate it.

We should never try to give intellectual food and spiritual food to the public which we think should be easy for it, because the public answers negatively.

The public, whatever public in the world, is much more intelligent than what we think it is.

- [Woman] This man had a way of embracing everybody around him and making everybody feel so special.

And his way, his manner of conducting was so vital and lifelike, people have worked with major conductors throughout the world, wanted Spiros to work with them, because he breathed every phrase, and he brought out the best in this orchestra.

He brought out the best in everybody around him.

He's gonna be sorely missed.

(singing in foreign language) (claps hands) - I hear "leh" instead of "leh", "leh".

I don't hear it on the beat.

Two, three, four... (singing in foreign language) Good!

- [Beryl] The voices of the Westminster choir, under the skillful baton of Joseph Flummerfelt, are almost synonymous with the sounds of Spoleto.

- And the conductor has a fair idea of what he's about.

(laughing) I can say with... - [Interviewer] With some certainty.

- With some cer... (laughing) That's what I do, you know.

That's what I do.

And I have a sound in my ear and a way of working, and it will always, unless some of my faculties begin to wane, it will always hopefully maintain that standing, yeah.

(emotional choir music) - The chorus joined the Italian Spoleto Festival in 1972.

They came aboard for Spoleto USA at the beginning in 1977.

This amazing group of young singers has appeared with most to the major symphonies in the U.S. and in Europe.

These include the New York Philharmonic, the Pittsburgh Symphony, Le Orchestre de Paris, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the National Symphony.

They've appeared at Carnegie Hall in more than 300 concerts, and they've worked under the batons of Toscanini, Walter, Rodzinski, Bernstein and Mader.

But at Spoleto, it's the Flummerfelt felt baton that essentially defines them as an entity.

(moving choir music) The Westminster Choir has been the official festival choir since the inception of Spoleto in Charleston.

What has this relationship meant for the choir and for you personally?

- Oh, that's a big question.

For the choir, of course, it's an extraordinary opportunity to come to this beautiful city and be a part of the festival and... to learn from the variety of things which they do and also, of course, be able to hear, to go to ballet, to go to chamber music, and, in that sense, really immerse themselves in a variety of the arts for the three weeks that we're here.

For myself, it's a long love affair with this festival.

- This the 25th anniversary season of Spoleto USA, mark Flummerfelt's 25th year with the American festival as well.

Central to the performances is the idea of education.

(singing in foreign language) Project EducationSPOLETO exposes students to various aspects of the arts.

In this instance, area high school students are given the benefit of a workshop and the chance to show what they've learned.

(singing in foreign language) Here, the Westminster Choir demonstrates its skill.

(choir singing) ♪ My soul is so happy that I can't sit down ♪ But it's the combined forces of both choirs under Flummerfelt's energetic direction that brings the audience to its feet.

(passionate choir music) ♪ Praise the lord praise the lord ♪ ♪ In glorious songs of joy ♪ In glorious songs of joy (audience applauding and cheering) (exciting instrumental music) Each year, the festival commissions and official poster.

The inaugural poster was created by artist Christian Thee and will be reissued in an anniversary edition for Spoleto 2001.

- The concept of, really... the way I think about it is a visitor comes to the garden, and everyone held their breath, and the garden being Charleston, and the visitor being this monkey.

The monkey's name is Spoleto.

And you don't know what is going to happen, what mischief he's going to create.

- [Beryl] A slightly altered version of these posters being offered as a 25th anniversary commemorative.

- I was delighted when Nigel Redden, they gave me a call several months ago and asked if they could reproduce that poster.

And I said, we can reproduce it if we can do better color, better paper, and let me add a few little twists to it so that it's not exactly the same as the original poster but pays homage to the original poster.

(bright instrumental music) - [Beryl] The visual arts had been a real mixed bag at the festival, from an eclectic array of painting exhibitions to an occasional burst of sculpture; that is, until site-specific art became a factor in 1991.

Playwright Edward Albee curated an early contemporary exhibition, which he called "Material Matters".

- There aren't many playwrights running around being curators of art shows that I know about.

I just happened to have been interested in the visual arts for a long time.

I Like them, and I think I know a fair amount about them.

And I don't quite know how I sort of moved into this field.

Maybe I wasn't happy with the way other people were curating all the shows that I wanted to see.

- [Beryl] Louise Nevelson's assemblage sculptures dominated the main gallery at the Gibbes Museum.

Now, meeting her was quite an adventure.

- Now, I used to say I wanna buy a dress.

Well, I don't go in stores anymore, but let's say.

Well, if I took someone, they'll say, "Oh, no, that doesn't look good on you."

And they had no taste, and certainly it wasn't mine, so I learned to be a soloist and have the conviction and the courage, if you wish, to live my life.

And I made it like there's a lot of air around me so that no one's pushing.

(bright classical guitar music) - [Beryl] That same year, South Carolina native son Robert Courtright returned with his signature mask collages.

- As you're doing the mask, you'll find the mask takes on...

It almost speaks to you.

And it changes with every every piece that you add to it, the masks become something else again.

- [Beryl] The sculptor Arman and Tom Bianchi were featured artists in '84.

Arman's whimsical musical instrument sculptures seemed oddly right at home.

(lively jazz music) A retrospective of recent sculptures by Roy Lichtenstein caused excitement in '85.

(upbeat instrumental music) But North Carolina Glass '86 was, in one word, breathtaking.

(exciting instrumental music) 1988 featured a retrospective by camera shy Spoleto poster artist Larry Rivers.

(gentle piano music) (bright horn music) While in 1993, poster artist David Hughes proved anything but shy.

His "Minari in the Catbird Seat" poster is still considered a classic.

- I love him, I hate him.

He's a madman.

I'm a madman.

We get on it with each other.

We're spiritual brothers.

We're soul brothers.

We're blues brothers.

(laughs) - [Beryl] Distinctive and undeniably the work of David Hughes.

(curious percussion music) Willie Birch's "From Bertrandville to Brooklyn" brought social commentary and art to a new level.

- I want my art to stay right in the back of your head for a long time and begin to question if you are part of the problem or if you're part of the solution.

(light classical music) - One of the most prominent exhibits ever, the sculptures of Igor Mitoraj evoked classicism.

- [Igor] The classical man made a intellectual and emotional leap from humanness to sort of divinity.

They were aspiring towards making man perfect.

Some people aren't gonna like it.

I think some people are going to hate it.

And that's exciting.

It's very exciting.

'Cause those who hate it obviously are responding to the artwork.

Those who like it are responding to it, too, and nobody's gonna leave the show feeling indifferent.

(spirited orchestral music) - Then, in 1995, the Hillary Clinton-spearheaded exhibition "20th Century Sculptures at the White House" again brought sculptures to the fore.

- President and Mrs. Clinton wanted to make sure that living American artists were represented in the White House for the first time.

This breaks a long-standing tradition.

And so the exhibition that is here at the Gibbes Art Museum now, in the garden, was at the garden at the White House previously and was organized under the auspices of Mrs. Clinton.

(bright instrumental music) (upbeat pop music) - Rhonda Roland Shearer's tongue-in-cheek exhibition "Woman's Work" added a much-needed female component to the visual art scene.

♪ I can do anything ♪ I am strong ♪ I am invincible ♪ I am woman But it was 1991's site-specific installations, "Places with a Past", that brought the visual arts to the forefront and threatened to bring the Spoleto Festival USA to a standstill.

- The controversy had nothing to do with me.

- Now artists want to deal with content, and the exhibition that we've organized here is one that's very much about content.

- Nothing but sophomoric stunts and that are justified by by very pure explanations and then have nothing to do with the art, as far as I'm concerned.

I think it's a waste of money, and I have nothing to do with it.

I don't want to talk about it.

- The mandate was to do something as significant in the visual arts as Spoleto has been known for doing in the performing arts.

(choir singing) - I want this work to be open.

I want it to be experienced absolutely freely.

There's no message.

The bodies are attached to the ceiling.

and you see the neck passing through a hole in the ceiling.

And it's not clear whether the head is there or not, but obviously the illusion there is that the head is in another space.

The entire installation, I think, profits from this context, which is about containment.

(upbeat instrumental music) - I had this image of this blue mound of clothes, and I work very much from images, so part of my process is to unravel what that might mean.

♪ The working the working just the working life ♪ ♪ Oh it's the working the working just the working life ♪ (humming) - What I particularly like about the piece is that she simply didn't pontificate on the work ethic; she engaged in the work ethic.

And for me, that gave her piece a kind of infectious integrity.

(bizarre instrumental music) (overlapping speech) - What interests me... was that this was the kind of giant slave port of the South.

This was the center.

And I felt very attracted to do a piece about that.

- [Recording] Eyes have they... but they see not.

They have ears... but they hear not.

(whistling) ♪ People can make it work ♪ Come together ♪ And make it work ♪ We can make it work - Initially was, every artist.... first, he wants to get your attention.

So I have to get the attention of the masses.

So I created it so thin that it'll look... surreal.

So the title of the piece is "House of the Future", because I think we will be living in very small... like the computer, everything compacted into a small space.

So the house of the future will be this size, 'cause the world is becoming over-populated.

- And he did, in fact, also succeed in breaking a historical barrier, and that barrier being the barrier between Blacks and Spoleto.

- Some I'm down here learning.

(light classical music) - [Beryl] In 1997, the festival again attempted a site-specific installation: "Human Nature: Art and landscape in Charleston and the Lowcountry."

- [Artist] This has always been one of my favorite areas of this park, White Point Gardens.

The structure itself is a architectural form which is built of living material.

This is a very short-lived work.

It's very quiet in there, and it's gonna be 10 degrees cooler in there than it is outside, just because of the insulation value of the material.

And hopefully, it'll just be a very serene, contemplative space that I hope people will use to just think about their surroundings and nature, and maybe our presence in nature, man's presence in nature.

That's mainly what it's about, I suppose.

(group singing) - [Beryl] Martha Jackson, Jarvis chose to deal with one aspect of Charleston's history by creating an inventive sculptural garden.

She titled her work "Rice, Rattlesnakes and Rainwater".

- And I think that, oftentimes, art is so removed and elevated into the elites, the pristine museum spaces and these elegant things, and you must dress a certain way to enter and talk a certain way to be there, and it's intimidating.

♪ I want to go to heaven ♪ When I die And then I had to ask myself, what would I really like for this piece?

The is really for Charleston.

I don't think this piece will be out of place... anywhere else.

It's sited for here.

I don't think, if it has to move, it'll ever be as at home.

♪ My lord steal away ♪ Steal away ♪ Oh ♪ Steal away ♪ I believe I ♪ Steal away ♪ I - [Beryl] Conjuring up another aspect of Charleston's history, Martha Schwartz chose "McLeod Plantation" as the site of an installation evocative of the mid-1800s.

- [Man] It's a complicated piece.

And clearly there's some commentary about the slave cabins and about the laundry and about people having put clothes up on lines for many, many years and having washed those clothes.

And there's something kind of liberating about that sense of the wind taking one and taking one away from the place as it is.

♪ Steal away ♪ Jesus ♪ Steal away ♪ Steal away ♪ Oh ♪ Steal away ♪ My my my my my my ♪ Steal away (exciting instrumental music) - [Beryl] All in all, by the year 2000, Spoleto's visual arts, much like Joel Shapiro's stick figures, had charted new territory and defied the laws of gravity.

- I don't engineer my work.

I don't make it convenient for engineers.

I insist that the engineering conforms with the artistic impulse rather than my impulse being edited by engineering, so they're really tough to put up.

It's not some alien situation.

I'm not trying to make magical surfaces.

It's very straightforward.

And I think, at this point, what I wanna do is really disrupt gravity with work.

I don't want gravity to have as profound an organizational effect on my work as I think it has had.

And sort of turn things around and upside down.

I'm interested in change.

(exciting instrumental music) (lively jazz music) - Despite Menotti's early objections, jazz has emerged as one of Spoleto's true stellar facets.

From the promising up-and-coming artists to the true luminaries of the 20th and now the 21st centuries, jazz is what's happening.

(intriguing jazz music) The incredible John Hendricks and Company, the standard bearers for vocalese.

Not to be confused with scattering, perhaps a demonstration would be in order.

(scatting) - That's scatting to "Bye Bye Blackbird".

But vocalese is if you put words to Miles Davis's version of "Bye Bye Blackbird".

♪ Back of my care and woe ♪ Here I go ♪ Swinging low ♪ Bye bye blackbird And that's vocalese.

- [Interviewer] Ah!

- So that's the difference.

(singing vocalese) - [Beryl] That could only be the Woody Herman with his Thundering Herd.

(energetic jazz music) - [Woody] Well, years ago we had highly stylized bands, people like Tommy Dorsey.

Even Benny Goodman.

When you heard one arrangement, you knew who it was immediately, and you knew that they all would be something like that.

And of course, I think Glen Miller was the real stylistic purveyor of music.

You could tell the first note that it was Glen Miller.

This is something I would hate to have attached to me.

I don't want anyone to know who I am that quickly.

(passionate blues music) - [Beryl] And just in case you're too young to recognize him, this is the King.

B.B.

King, that is.

(passionate blues music) ♪ Now I want you to tell the ice man, ♪ ♪ The next time he better leave some ice ♪ ♪ And I want you to tell the postman ♪ ♪ He better ring more him twice ♪ (crowd hollers) ♪ And when I come home from work in the mornings ♪ ♪ Better still be some groceries on the shelf ♪ ♪ And I want you to tell that slick insurance man ♪ ♪ That he better write some insurance on his self ♪ (audience cheering) ♪ I think you're cheatin' on me baby ♪ ♪ I think you're runnin' out on me ♪ ♪ I believe through my soul baby ♪ ♪ You've given me some help ♪ Some help ♪ Some help I really need (audience cheering) (bouncy jazz music) - [Beryl] Catch that rhythm.

It changed the way we looked at time signatures.

It's Dave Brubeck playing "Take Five".

When you wrote those pieces, like "Take Five" and "Blue Rondo a La Turk", did you have any idea they'd become the standards they have in today's jazz repertoire?

- No.

None whatsoever.

We were trying to do something new, something that would challenge the musicians and the public, and it became the first million seller in the history of jazz.

(energetic jazz music) - [Beryl] This is the one and only Mary Lou Williams.

She was an original on the jazz scene and a terrific composer to boot.

- This is such an important, great art.

After you play it and play it as long as I have, you just play whatever comes to you.

I close my eyes, and seem like I just go away.

I don't know where I go to, but it's beautiful wherever it is, and play, in the hopes of sending out love and whatnot to my audience.

- [Interviewer] Jazz has always been considered a man's domain.

How have you managed to not only to survive, but to excel in this field?

I mean, all of them speak of you in the highest terms.

- I wonder myself, because you know, I've done a lot of things some men haven't done in jazz.

I've done some fantastic things that you wouldn't expect a woman to do in her 20s.

Of course I was the little girl and whatnot, but I played with Duke Ellington's Washingtonians in the pit of the Lincoln Theater in New York before I was 14 years old.

And I met Fats Waller and played at the place where he was.

I was always with men, sitting on some man's lap, playing, even though my feet couldn't touch the floor.

They'd put me up on their lap.

And I've done some amazing things that I don't know, I don't know why all this happened to me, but I appreciate it, not because I can pass it on to others.

I think that's the reason for doing it, you know.

- [Beryl] One who has made it and is acknowledged as the bebop innovator for tenor saxophone players is Dexter Gordon.

A master saxophonist, Gordon developed his celebrated style during the swing era of the 40s, working with the bands of Lionel Hampton, Louis Armstrong, Billy Eckstine and Charlie Parker.

Leaving the states in '62, he gained international acclaim in the major European capitols, but returned triumphantly to the U.S. in 1977.

(lively jazz music) (relaxed jazz music) Some call her sassy.

Others, the Divine One.

The references are, of course, for the superb jazz vocalist Miss Sarah Vaughn, who, even at an impromptu rehearsal session, exemplifies an indomitable style.

♪ When you're with me ♪ Oh my Jim G ♪ Whoa (light piano music) - [Announcer] Pianist, composer, author, critic.

Who else but Billy Taylor.

(light piano music) (upbeat jazz music) - You know, when I came to the stage...

There was Billie Holiday.

And after 35 years on the stage, there is still Billie Holiday.

♪ Them that's got shall get ♪ Them that's not shall lose (audience applauding) ♪ So the Bible says ♪ And it still is news - I come from... many singers.

I learned from Lena Horne and Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan.

(humming) (slow jazz music) (audience applauding) - I'm looking forward to this with deep anticipation... and agony!

(laughing) - [Interviewer] Agony.

(laughing) (smooth jazz music) - [Beryl] Dizzy and His Jazz Giants, along with the youthful Jazz All Stars, they made Jazz at Magnolia and event to remember.

(upbeat jazz music) - That there's a masterpiece on the stage today, and I hope the people realize what it is.

Because these guys... they are the epitome of our arts.

(exciting jazz music) - We've become old friends, and I look forward to our annual reunion, especially in this anniversary year.

And so it is with a great sense of pride and anticipation that I invite you to join us for the Spoleto Festival USA.

- Beryl, the biggest hurdle for Spoleto is to never ever lose sight of the fact that it is a world artistic event, and to always demand excellence.

- Charleston is not going to let anybody steal their festival from them, and they're going to keep it long enough for history to write about it and the festival still being lived in at that time.