The Girls in the Band tells the poignant, untold stories of female jazz and big band instrumentalists and their fascinating, groundbreaking journeys from the late 1930s to the present day. These incredibly talented women endured sexism, racism and diminished opportunities for decades, yet continued to persevere, inspire and elevate their talents in a field that seldom welcomed them. In the thirties and forties, hundreds of women musicians toured the country in glamorous All-Girl Bands, while others played side by side with their male counterparts. By the mid-fifties, female jazz musicians had literally disappeared from the workplace; their names, their contributions to music, completely forgotten.Today, there is a new breed of gifted young women taking their rightful place in the world of jazz, which can no longer deny their talents.