Charlie parker last photo

Charlie "Bird" Parker

Full Name: Charles Christopher Parker, Jr.

Born: August 29, 1920

Died: March 12, 1955 (age 34)

Missouri Hometown: Kansas City

Region of Missouri: Kansas City

Categories: African Americans, Musicians

Charlie Parker was a pioneering jazz saxophonist and composer, famous for his role in founding the innovative bebop style of jazz in the early 1940s. He was born on August 29, 1920, in Kansas City, Kansas, to Charles Parker, Sr. and Addie Boxley Parker. He moved with his parents to Kansas City, Missouri, in 1927. There Charlie attended Penn School and Sumner School. After his parents split up in 1932 due to his father’s alcoholism, Charlie moved in with his mother. He attended Lincoln High School the next year. After joining the school’s renowned band program, Charlie was inspired to play his alto saxophone every day for hours on end, much to the irritation of his neighbors.

In those years the corrupt Pendergast political machine controlled Kansas City. The machine allowed hundreds of nightclubs across the city

Charlie Parker

American jazz musician (1920–1955)

This article is about the American jazz musician. For other people with the same name, see Charlie Parker (disambiguation).

Musical artist

Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazzsaxophonist, bandleader, and composer.[1][2] Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop,[3] a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, virtuosic technique, and advanced harmonies. He was a virtuoso and introduced revolutionary rhythmic and harmonic ideas into jazz, including rapid passing chords, new variants of altered chords, and chord substitutions. Parker was primarily a player of the alto saxophone.

Parker was an icon for the hipster subculture and later the Beat Generation, personifying the jazz musician as an uncompromising artist and intellectual rather than just an entertainer.[4]

Early life

Charles Parker Jr. was born in Kansas City, Kansas, to Charles Parker Sr. and Adela

Charlie Parker

His Music and Life

Revised Edition

ByCarl Woideck

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A fresh take on Charlie Parker’s artistic evolution and major achievements as a jazz improviser, in time for his centennial

Saxophonist Charlie Parker (1920-1955) was one of the most innovative and influential jazz musicians of any era. As one of the architects of modern jazz (often called "bebop"), Charlie Parker has had a profound effect on American music. His music reached such a high level of melodic, rhythmic, and harmonic sophistication that saxophonists and other instrumentalists continue to study it as both a technical challenge and an aesthetic inspiration. This revised edition of Charlie Parker: His Music and Life has been revised throughout to account for new Charlie Parker scholarship and previously unknown Parker recordings that have emerged since the book’s initial publication. The volume opens by considering current resea

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