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{"value"=>"<p>Series I documents George Avakian's personal history and his working and personal relationships with key 20th century musicians and artists, both American and foreign, from his time with major recording labels (1938 to the mid-1960s), to his independent work from the mid-1960s onward, to his later work on reissues of his classic productions. The series also gives evidence to his relationships with other key figures in the music and recording industries, such as producers, scholars, and writers, from the United States and other nations. The series holds personal and business correspondence; business and management records; Avakian's notes and writings throughout his career; Avakian's military files; and a scrapbook.</p> <p>Artists with the most representation in this series are Louis Armstrong, Miles Davis, Keith Jarrett, and Charles Lloyd. Other artists with substantial documentation include Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, John Cage, Sonny Rollins, Dave Brubeck, Wild Bill Davison, Paul Desmond, John Eaton, the Everly Brothers, Erroll Garner, Alan Hovhaness, Dick Hyman, Johnny Mathis, Helen Merrill, Turk Murphy, Bob Newhart, Orchestra U.S.A., and Ravi Shankar.</p> <p>Other major topics covered in the papers include the development of Columbia Records during Avakian's time with the company; Avakian's World War II army service and his writings during it; the film <span class=\"title\">Jazz On A Summer's Day</span>; the Music for Moderns concert series; the Newport Jazz Festival; jazz in the Soviet Union; jazz history; and the commercial and technical development of the recording business. These files contain correspondence with producers, musicians, researchers, and journalists; Avakian's writings on the subjects; concert programs; and clippings. Smaller file sets contain correspondence with musicians, colleagues, and friends, and detail many recording or performance projects which Avakian produced or helped assemble from the 1970s to the 2010s.</p> <p>As a general rule, artists and projects recorded for Columbia Records have little contemporaneous documentation in the collection (apart from photographs) because Avakian did not take his office files with him when he departed the company. Instead, Columbia projects are evidenced by correspondence regarding reissue projects, writings, clippings, and interview transcripts. Contemporaneous documents are more common for World Pacific, Warner Brothers, and RCA productions. Major portions of this series document work done on reissues of albums, not the original productions.</p> <p>In addition to the subseries descriptions below, further description of file contents can be found in the container list.</p>"}