With a provisional transmission time of 9pm on Friday 10th May, BBC 4 is due to broadcast a new documentary Queens of Jazz: The Joy and Pain of the Jazz Divas., charting the stories of Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee, Sarah Vaughan, Nina Simone and Annie Ross.

The 60 minute programme “takes an unflinching and revealing look at what it actually took to be a jazz diva during a turbulent time in America’s social history”.

The programme will feature contributions from singers: Annie Ross, Lisa Stansfield, Melody Gardot, Diana Krall, Madeleine Peyroux, Claire Martin, Anita Wardell, Barb Jungr, Carleen Anderson, Tina May and Gregory Porter.

Other jazz people who were inteviewed for the documentary include musicians Bucky Pizzarelli and Bob Dorough critics Gary Giddins, Dave Gelly, Alvin Hall, Loren Schoenberg, plus Holly Foster Wells (Peggy Lee’s grand-daughter) and George Wein, founder of the Newport Jazz Festival.