The sweet syncopations of Scott Joplin and the marvelous melodies of Irving Berlin can't bring to life "The Tin Pan Alley Rag," a soggy, inert examination of what made these musical masters tick. The Roundabout Theatre Company production, which opened Tuesday at its Laura ...

Judged by their facades alone, the block of 19th-century houses on West 28th Street just off Broadway in Manhattan would have little to detain the passerby. They are painted a sickly shade of green, and front an array of bucket shops selling hastily printed Obama T-shirts, cheap jewellery and imitation perfumes. But to initiates in the history of early 20th-century ...

The iconography of jazz usually features smoky images of coolly wasted-looking individuals in natty hats blowing saxophones. But if saxes and trumpets have seemed like the quintessential jazz instruments, it's the piano that has been absolutely central to the development of the music. Jazz began in the early years of the 20th century, with the coming-together of several musical ...