John Birks “Dizzy” Gillespie (October 21, 1917 – January 6, 1993- died at age 75) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, singer, and composer. Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz. He taught and influenced many other musicians, including trumpeters Miles Davis, Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown, Lee Morgan, and John Faddis.
In addition to featuring in the epochal moments in bebop, he was instrumental in founding Afro-Cuban jazz, the modern jazz version of what early-jazz pioneer Jelly Roll Morton referred to as the “Spanish Tinge.” Gillespie was a trumpet virtuoso and gifted improviser, building on the virtuoso style of Roy Eldridge but adding layers of harmonic complexity previously unknown in jazz. Dizzy’s beret and horn-rimmed spectacles, his scat singing, his bent horn, pouched cheeks and his light-hearted personality were essential in popularizing bebop.
He was born in Cheraw, South Carolina, the youngest of nine children. Dizzy’s father, James, was a local bandleader, so instruments were made available to Dizzy. He started to play the piano at the age of four. Gillespie taught himself how to play the trombone as well as the trumpet all at the age of twelve. He would play his friend’s trumpet, and from the night that he heard his idol, Roy Eldridge, play on the radio, he dreamed of becoming a jazz musician. Dizzy Gillespie received a music scholarship to the Laurinburg Institute in Laurinburg, North Carolina. However, he turned it down to start his music career.
Dizzy’s first professional job was with the Frank Fairfax orchestra in 1935, after which he joined the respective orchestras of Edgar Hayes and subsequently Teddy Hill, essentially replacing his main influence Roy Eldridge as first trumpet in 1937. Teddy Hill’s Band was where Dizzy Gillespie made his first recording “King Porter Stomp”. Dizzy played with Teddy Hill’s Band for a year, and Cab Calloway‘s orchestra. Gillespie left Calloway in late 1941 over a notorious incident with a knife. Calloway did not like how Gillespie played his music, nor did he like the humor that Gillespie gave to the audience. During his time in Calloway’s band, Dizzy Gillespie started writing big band music for bandleaders like Woody Herman and Jimmy Dorsey.
Bebop was known as the first modern jazz style. However, it was unpopular in the beginning and was not viewed as positively as swing music was. Bebop was seen as an outgrowth of swing, not a revolution.
In 1948 Dizzy was involved in a traffic accident when the bicycle he was riding was bumped by an automobile. He was slightly injured, and found that he could no longer hit the B-flat above high C. He won the case, but the jury only awarded him $1000, in view of his high earnings up to that point.
Unlike his contemporary Miles Davis, Gillespie essentially remained true to the bebop style for the rest of his career. In 1960, he was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame. Con’tGillespie’s image is almost inseparable from his trademark trumpet whose bell was bent at a 45 degree angle rather than a traditional straight trumpet. In honor of this trademark, the Smithsonian’sNational Museum of American History has collected Gillespie’s B-flat trumpet. According to Gillespie’s autobiography, this was originally the result of accidental damage caused during a job on January 6, 1953, but the constriction caused by the bending altered the tone of the instrument, and Gillespie liked the effect. Gillespie’s biographer Alyn Shipton writes that Gillespie likely got the idea when he saw a similar instrument in 1937 in Manchester, England while on tour with the Teddy Hill Orchestra. Gillespie came across an English trumpeter who was using such an instrument because his vision was poor and the horn made reading music easier. According to this account (from British journalist Pat Brand) Gillespie was able to try out the horn and the experience led him, much later, to commission a similar horn for himself. Whatever the origins of Gillespie’s upswept trumpet, by June, 1954, Gillespie was using a professionally manufactured horn of this design, and it was to become a visual trademark for him for the rest of his life.