Carter tells the story of the hall itself, the personalities who ran it, and above all, the music and musicians of New Orleans.

Preservation Hall, located in the French Quarter just three blocks from the Mississippi River, remains an icon of New Orleans and an essential stop for all fans of traditional jazz. Since the early 1960s "The Hall" has served as a sanctuary for the Crescent City's rich and illustrious jazz heritage, a haven for players, and an incubator for successive generations of jazz musicians. Seven nights a week the venue fills to capacity with die-hard fans and curious tourists eager to hear live New Orleans jazz played by a mix of veteran musicians and up-and-coming players. Preservation Hall dedicates itself to the authentic performance of traditional jazz. The space inside seems simple, and a large portion of the audience must stand in the back, behind a limited number of benches, chairs, and floor cushions. The Hall has no dance floor and serves no food or drink. In Preservation Hall, the music alone fills the space between listener and player. In their rare behind-the-scenes portrait, New Orleans photographer Shannon Brinkman and audio documentarian Eve Abrams capture the rhythm and cool of this historic club with both a pulsating array of images and the heartfelt words of band members.

Preservation Hall, located in the French Quarter just three blocks from the Mississippi River, remains an icon of New Orleans and an essential stop for all fans of traditional jazz. Since the early 1960s "The Hall" has served as a sanctuary for the Crescent City's rich and illustrious jazz heritage, a haven for players, and an incubator for successive generations of jazz musicians. Seven nights a week the venue fills to capacity with die-hard fans and curious tourists eager to hear live New Orleans jazz played by a mix of veteran musicians and up-and-coming players. Preservation Hall dedicates itself to the authentic performance of traditional jazz. The space inside seems simple, and a large portion of the audience must stand in the back, behind a limited number of benches, chairs, and floor cushions. The Hall has no dance floor and serves no food or drink. In Preservation Hall, the music alone fills the space between listener and player. In their rare behind-the-scenes portrait, New Orleans photographer Shannon Brinkman and audio documentarian Eve Abrams capture the rhythm and cool of this historic club with both a pulsating array of images and the heartfelt words of band members.

The tale begins over three-hundred years ago, when the Fair People—the goblins, fairies, dragons, and other fabled and fantastic creatures of a dozen lands—fled the Old World for the New, seeking haven from the ways of Man. With them came their precious jewels: diamonds, rubies, emeralds, pearls... But then the Fair People vanished, taking with them their twelve fabulous treasures. And they remained hidden until now... Across North America, these twelve treasures, over ten-thousand dollars in precious jewels, are buried. The key to finding each can be found within the twelve full color paintings and verses of The Secret. Yet The Secret is much more than that. At long last, you can learn not only the whereabouts of the Fair People's treasure, but also the modern forms and hiding places of their descendants: the Toll Trolls, Maitre D'eamons, Elf Alphas, Tupperwerewolves, Freudian Sylphs, Culture Vultures, West Ghosts and other delightful creatures in the world around us. The Secret is a field guide to them all. Many "armchair treasure hunt" books have been published over the years, most notably Masquerade (1979) by British artist Kit Williams. Masquerade promised a jewel-encrusted golden hare to the first person to unravel the riddle that Williams cleverly hid in his art. In 1982, while everyone in Britain was still madly digging up hedgerows and pastures in search of the golden hare, The Secret: A Treasure Hunt was published in America. The previous year, author and publisher Byron Preiss had traveled to 12 locations in the continental U.S. (and possibly Canada) to secretly bury a dozen ceramic casques. Each casque contained a small key that could be redeemed for one of 12 jewels Preiss kept in a safe deposit box in New York. The key to finding the casques was to match one of 12 paintings to one of 12 poetic verses, solve the resulting riddle, and start digging. Since 1982, only two of the 12 casques have been recovered. The first was located in Grant Park, Chicago, in 1984 by a group of students. The second was unearthed in 2004 in Cleveland by two members of the Quest4Treasure forum. Preiss was killed in an auto accident in the summer of 2005, but the hunt for his casques continues.

Now updated to 2020, this is an account of the development and output of the great young traditional jazz band Tuba Skinny, which is based in New Orleans. Many recommendations are included of videos to watch and recordings available for purchase.

Set in New Orleans in the 1950s and 1960s, Sancton's passionate memoir pays tribute to the white father who raised him and to the black founding fathers of Jazz, "the mens" of Preservation Hall, who inspired and encouraged him as he grew, as a musician, and as a man.