A popular high school student seems to have it all; a spot on the football team, the love of playing music in the school orchestra and a girlfriend. His world seems to come apart when the school doctor discovers he is partially deaf, causing him to be cut from the football team on the advice of the doctor. The student's friends fight to keep him on the team; while he struggles with his problem by withdrawing from everything he loves and starts falling in with the wrong crowd.
Set at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, this documentary mixes images of water and the town with performers and audience. The film progresses from day to night and from improvisational music to Gospel. It's a concert film that suggests peace and leisure, jazz at a particular time and place.