American music is as various as the great sprawling country in which it originates. Like New York, the United States’ largest city in which everything can be found, the very abundance of this music is overwhelming. Most non-musicians associate American music with its folk traditions and their derivatives. These include the regional music of the Appalachians and the Southwest, work songs, political songs, marches, patriotic music, the musical, and especially the Negro spiritual, the blues, and the many phases in the evolution of jazz. Of all these, jazz is probably this country’s most original contribution and has had the greatest influence in the international musical scene on both popular and art music. It is important to mention that its principal formative influence has come from the black community.