The Bebop Legend
Dizzy Gillespie, father of be-bop with his signature bent
trumpet, left a legend so wide that it's still bumping elbows with today's best
jazz musicians and techniques. Composing, leading various bands, and pushing
the envelope in new techniques for almost 60 years, Gillespie created a sound
that this NY
Times article classified as "meteoric, full of virtuosic invention and
deadly serious." However, Gillespie was known also as an expert entertainer,
with his witty side remarks and habit of poking fun at the audience.
Gillespie was born in 1917 in Cheraw, South Carolina as John
Birks Gillespie. He started playing the trumpet at 14. After moving with his
family to Philadelphia at age 16, Gillespie started working with jazz
musicians. He even got fired for not knowing how to read music well enough, and
with Cab Calloway's band, with whom he got fired after getting in a fight on
stage with Calloway. However, while touring with the Calloway band, he met
Charlie Parker, with whom he created be-bop. As the article highlights, "Gillespie was blunt about his
relationship with Mr. Parker, calling him 'the other side of my heartbeat,' and
freely giving him credit for some of the rhythmic innovations of be-bop."
Finally, 1945 brought his sharp-edged sound to the public's
ear. Recording under his own name and with Parker, Gillespie created music
known for its "tight ensemble passages, precisely articulated rhythms and
dissonance" (NY Times). He also formed his first big band that year, and
underwent other transformations/reformations to his bands.
During the late 1940s Gillespie became increasingly
interested in Afro-Cuban jazz. Together with Chano Pozo, he wrote the album Manteca, and blew the top off of jazz
and Latin worlds.
In 1953, someone fell on Gillespie's trumpet, bending the
horn. After deciding he liked the sound more, he kept it that way, thus tagging
his trademark, having trumpet specially made that way from then on.
Gillespie, like most jazz musicians morphed through many
bands, both small and big, and even started his own record label, which
eventually went under. He recorded with a plethora of musicians, including
Thelonius Monk, Max Roach, Charles Mingus, Stan Getz and many more. He won a
Grammy both in 1975 and 1980, and toured frequently during the 60s and 70s.
His presence, tumultuous, humorous, and irrevocably
talented, permeates the jazz culture today, and I'm looking forward to seeing
Danilo Perez: 21st Century Dizzy in April as his all star group reincarnates this living legacy.
- Melissa Wray,Marketing Intern
