The Dance Clarinets—an ensemble of a dozen clarinets of all shapes and sizes plus drums, led by J. D. Parran—performs a music from the Ragtime era by the seminal bandleader, union organizer, and advocate of African-American music and culture, James Reese Europe. A set of music with clarinets and a jazz rhythm section follows the large ensemble.

Europe was the musical director for the 369th Infantry Brigade, an all African-American and Puerto Rican military unit that was sent to the front lines in France at the end of World War I and that became the single most decorated unit of the war, that never lost a battle, and that was nicknamed “the Harlem Hellfighters” for their ferocity. They revolutionized music by presenting an African-diasporic revisioning of marching band music that amazed European audiences and that provided a link between marching band music and jazz big band music.