ALL THAT JAZZ AS SATCHMO ONCE SAID, IF YOU HAVE TO ASK WHAT JAZZ IS, YOU'LL NEVER KNOW.

Byline: David Kronke Television Writer

In his previous collaborations with Ken Burns, writer Geoffrey Ward admits he discouraged the acclaimed documentarian from doing ``The Civil War''- ``I thought it'd be too hard.'' Of ``Frank Lloyd Wright,'' Ward says, ``I didn't think it would be interesting,'' and, of ``Baseball,'' ``Ken was the baseball fan; I was paying my dues.''

This time, though, Ward had no qualms about the subject matter: His latest collaboration with Burns, ``Jazz,'' just may be their most ambitious yet, clocking in at nearly 19 hours and resulting from six years of work. ``Ken went at it as someone who hadn't been a big fan, and I went at it as a fan for the past 50 years. I had such a good time on this one, the book even more so. It was a labor of love.''

Burns - currently at work on a film about Mark Twain - says when committing to a documentary subject, ``My head never chooses; my heart does. When you look at a woman, you don't think, 'OK, she's beautiful, she's smart, she can cook, she can sew'; you just say, 'Wow, I'm very attracted here.' That's how it was here.''

``Jazz'' is a kaleidoscopic experience, covering more than a century of the music, employing evocative period photography and amazing archival footage of seminal performers. From the slave fields of the South to the brothels of New Orleans to the bright, brassy big-band ballrooms to the smoky late-night bars where heroin was available out in the alley, ``Jazz'' explores both the social context in which the music grew and flourished and the disparate personalities of those who forged a musical form that Burns calls ``the only true American art form.''

Respected jazz writer Nat Hentoff, who has produced jazz programs himself and is interviewed in ``Jazz,'' calls Burns' latest effort ``very important. There's never been anything like it. He's gotten some material that's new even to people who have been following the music all their life. I thought I knew a lot about Louis Armstrong, but Ossie Davis' story about seeing him sitting in his dressing room with the saddest expression on his face is a little epiphany. Dave Brubeck crying (while recalling racism against friends and fellow musicians) is very effective.''

Still, when dealing with such a sprawling subject, Burns had tough choices when exploring the music's minutiae. In addition to relating the overarching historical facts of the music, many anecdotal stories included for their humor or poignancy - an early one has Bessie Smith brashly facing down Klansmen outside her tent show before returning to her performance - and Burns still laments the many he had to excise.

``There are thousands of stories not in there that I wish were in,'' he says.

``Jazz'' is also noteworthy for generously presenting extended performances of the music itself, rather than the usual, unsatisfying eight-bar snippets most films devote to music. ``That's where our initial ignorance paid off - it's nothing show-offy,'' Burns says. ``We'd hear about a musician and wonder, 'What makes him so special?' We had to prove it to ourselves at first, and then we thought, while putting the film together, 'Let's just stop and listen.' We wanted to make sure the genius of the music would come to the fore, so that any idiot - in other words, we - could get it.''

Ward says, ``For me, it's a story of people who I think should be seen as great American heroes but who aren't thought of that way,'' he continues. ``Armstrong, Duke Ellington, all those guys from the early days - what they achieved against that social background, all the things they had to contend with, is truly heroic. There's a sort of sense of them being legendary heroes - Coleman Hawkins would try to find someone who could outplay him. They were like gunfighters, only they were musicians, and I loved those parallels.''

Burns adds, ``If this was a political story, these people would be gracing Mount Rushmore.''

Indeed, one of Burns and Ward's chief goals was to polish the hazy public perceptions of Armstrong and Ellington, the two men who molded the music into what it is today, but whose own reputations have dimmed alongside more recent, more vital-seeming innovators like Charlie Parker, Miles Davis and John Coltrane.

``In the '60s, Armstrong began to be misperceived as old-fashioned and corny,'' agrees Lynn Novick, producer of ``Jazz.'' ``There was a shadow of minstrelsy in his performance, and that reminded people of something they didn't want to go back to, it made them uncomfortable. People remember Armstrong's icon and entertainer status, but not his genius.

``Parker set the tone with a different attitude toward the press, the public and his audience,'' Novick continues. ``He didn't smile; he didn't try to be an entertainer in the way that Ellington and Armstrong did, which appealed to some fans. Miles took it further - he seemed to have contempt for them. People were suitably entertained if he was rude to them, whereas Ellington would end every concert by telling his crowd, 'We love you madly.' The film comes to terms with the magnitude of what the earlier generation did.''

Despite ``Jazz's'' value as an educational tool - a package has been developed so some 6 million students will learn about the music and its social history - the film, of course, has become controversial before it has even aired. Burns is unfazed, noting that ``all of our advisers couldn't have ever been in one room at the same time without a fistfight breaking out.''

Chief among the gripes is that the film pays short shrift to contemporary jazz - the film covers the past 40 years in its last two-hour installment - and its reliance on trumpet player Wynton Marsalis in interviews exaggerates his own importance in the music's history.

``My one reservation is, he cuts it off very quickly,`` Hentoff says.

``There's very little after Coltrane, and there's not very much on Coltrane. Charles Mingus was almost as important a composer as Ellington, yet he's dealt with briefly.'' Hentoff is more forgiving of Marsalis' seeming ubiquity. ``There's no faulting him as a good educator, but the problem is his prominence in the film can suggest that he's regarded as a top-flight musician.''

``We didn't set out to make Wynton a centerpiece of the film; it just quickly emerged that he had a gift, a central understanding of the music and a way of expressing himself,'' Novick says. ``As an evangelist for the gospel of jazz, no one's better. He told us, 'If you put me in it, people will be unhappy.' But we also use (respected jazz critic) Gary Giddins as much or more, and he and Wynton don't get along. They're not very complimentary to each other.''

As for the rush job on jazz's recent past, Burns notes that there's a general critical consensus that the music has lost some of its innovation, which is reflected in sales - where the music once accounted for 70 percent of record sales in America, it now hovers around 2 or 3 percent.

``I hope someone will do a film on jazz's modern era - that'd make a great film,'' Novick says. ``But it's disappointing to hear these complaints before anyone has seen the film. If all these experts would take a couple of steps back, they'd see that the film is good for all jazz.''

``JAZZ''

Where: KCET.

When: Monday: ``Gumbo,'' the music's origins, up to 1917; Tuesday: ``The Gift,'' 1917-1924; Wednesday: ``Our Language,'' 1924-1928. Jan 15: ``The True Welcome,'' 1929-1935. Jan. 17: ``Swing: Pure Pleasure,'' 1935-1937. Jan. 22: ``Swing: The Velocity of Celebration,'' 1937-1939. Jan. 23: ``Dedicated to Chaos,'' 1940-1945. Jan. 24: ``Risk,'' 1945-1955. Jan. 29: ``The Adventure,'' 1956-1960. Jan. 31: ``A Masterpiece by Midnight,'' 1961 to the present.

Other options

For those of you who would prefer not to be stuck to PBS' schedule on ``Jazz,'' you can already buy it on tape and DVD. The 10-tape set from PBS lists for $149, and the 10-disc DVD version is $199.92. (Both can be had for less). The DVD set includes lots of bonus features, including a ``making of'' featurette, background information on the more than 500 songs heard in the program, three full-length performances not seen in the PBS broadcast and links to the ``Jazz'' Web site.

There is also a companion coffee-table book from Knopf, ``Jazz: A History of America's Music'' ($65) by Geoffrey Ward and Ken Burns.

- Daily News

The music's what matters

When ``Jazz'' debuts Monday on PBS television station KCET, you won't have to miss one funky note, even if you're in the midst of a freeway jam session.

That's because Long Beach jazz radio KLON-FM (88.1) will broadcast the entire 10-part series, starting at 9 p.m. Monday.

Other KLON installments can be heard at 9 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday, Jan. 15, 17, 22-24, 29 and 31.

- Fred Shuster

CAPTION(S):

9 photos, 2 boxes

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) `Jazz' stories

Ken Burns tells us about his monumental documentary on `America's art form' while singer Ruth Price talks about living the life

Eric Grigorian/Special to the Daily News

(2 -- 6) Clockwise, from above: Wynton Marsalis; King Oliver Band; Billie Holiday; Benny Goodman; original lyrics, ``Strange Fruit;'' Louis Armstrong; original score, ``Taking the A-Train'' by Billy Strayhorn.

(7) Filmmaker Ken Burns

(8) Charlie Parker the Metronome All Stars

(9) Frankie Trumbauer

Box: (1) Other options (see text)

(2) The music's what matters (see text)