# John Birks Dizzy Gillespie, along with Charlie Parker, ushered in the era of Be-Bop in the American jazz tradition: Video

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2017/10/22/john-birks-dizzy-gillespie-along-with-charlie-parker-ushered-in-the-era-of-be-bop-in-the-american-jazz-tradition-video/
- Published: 2017-10-22T13:05:14+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**21.10. – Happy Birthday !!! He was born Cheraw, South Carolina, and was the youngest
of nine children. **

He began playing piano at the age of four and received a music scholarship to the
Laurinburg Institute in North Carolina. Most noted for his trademark “swollen cheeks”,
Gillespie admitted to copying the style of trumpeter Roy Eldridge early in his career.

He replaced Eldridge in the ‘Teddy Hill’ Band after Eldridge’s departure. He eventually
began experimenting and creating his own style which would eventually come to the
attention of Mario Bauza, the Godfather of Afro-Cuban jazz who was then a member
of the Cap Calloway Orchestra, joining Calloway in 1939, Gillespie was fired after
two years when he cut a portion of the Calloway’s buttocks with a knife after Calloway
accused him of throwing spitballs (the two men later became lifelong friends and
often retold this story with great relish until both of their deaths).

Although noted for his on and off-stage clowning, Gillespie endured as one of the
founding fathers of the Afro-Cuban &/or Latin Hazz tradition. Influenced by Bauza,
known as Gillespies musical father, he was able to fuse Afro-American jazz and Afro-
Cuban rhythms to form a burgeoning CuBop sound. Always a musical ambassador, he 
toured Africa, the Middle East and Latin America under the sponsorship of the US
State Department. Quite often he returned, not only with fresh musical ideas, but
with musicians who would eventually go on the achieve world renown.

Among his proteges and collaborators are ‘Chano Pozo’. the great Afro-Cuban percussionist;
Danilo perez, a master pianist and composer originally from Pnama; Arturo Sandoval,
trumpeter, composer and music educator originally from Cuba; Mongo Santamaria, an
Afro-Cuban conguero, bongeuro and composer; David Sanchez, saxophonist and composer;
Chucho Valdes, an Afro-Cuban virtuoso pianist and composer; and Bobby Sanabria, 
a Bronx, NY-born Nuyorican percussionist, composer, educator, bandleader and expert
in the Afro-Cuban musical tradition. Indeed, many Latin jazz classics such as “Manteca”,“
A Night in Tunisia” and “Guachi Guaro [Soul Sauce]” were composed by Gillespie and
his musical collaborators.

With a strong sense of pride in his Afro-American heritage, he left a legacy of 
musical excellence that embraced and fused all musical forms, but particularly those
forms with roots deep in Africa such as the music of Cuba, other Latin American 
countries and the Caribbean. Additionally, he left a legacy of goodwill and good
humor that infused jazz musicians and fans throughout the world with the genuine
sense of jazz’s ability to transcend national and ethnic boundaries—for this reason,
Gillespie was and is an international treasure.

##### Awards

New Star Award, Esquire Magazine (1944); Handel Medallion, City of New York (1972);
Paul Robeson Award, Rutgers University Institute of Jazz Studies (1972); Performs“
Salt Peanuts” with President Carter at White House Jazz Concert (1978); Inducted
into Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame (1982); Lifetime Achievement Award, National
Association of Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS) (1989); National Medal of Arts,
President Bush (1989); Duke Ellington Award, Society of Composers, Authors, and 
Publishers (1989); Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (1989); Kennedy Center Honors
Award (1990); Fourteen honorary degrees, including Ph.D., Rutgers University (1972);
Ph.D., Chicago Conservatory of Music (1978); Awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk
of Fame.

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