Dizzy Gillespie Biography

His father was an amateur musician, and Dizzy started learning the trumpet and trombone in 1929. He moved to Philadelphia in 1935 where he started to write music, play in big bands and where he first earned his nickname.

After a couple of years he moved to New York, joined the Teddy Hill Orchestra and made some of his first recordings as a soloist.

The early 1940s proved a busy time for jazz, and Dizzy joined and toured with various big bands, including The Cab Calloway Orchestra and The Les Hite Orchestra.

This was an important time because he started composing tunes that he became famous for, such as 'Pickin' The Cabbage', 'Salt Peanuts' and 'Woody 'n' You', shaping the development of modern jazz. It is considered that Dizzy achieved his greatest mastery of the trumpet from 1945-50.

His signature trumpet, with an upturned end, first resulted from an accident in 1953, when Dizzy found that he preferred the sound it made this way.

Dizzy continued touring, formed his own orchestra and set up his own record label. Later in his career, a Latin influence melded with his style of jazz music.

He also had political ambitions, and ran for president in 1964. He promised that if he were elected, the White House would be renamed "The Blues House," Ray Charles would be appointed Librarian of Congress, Miles Davis would become the head of the CIA, and Malcolm X the Attorney General!

His autobiography was published in 1979, entitled 'To Be Or Not To Bop'. Dizzy has a huge discography of albums recorded in the studio and at live performances.

He died in January 1991, his last album, 'Dizzy Gillespie and the United Orchestra', having been recorded live in London not long before. At the time of his death, Dizzy was survived by his widow, Lorraine Willis Gillespie; a daughter, jazz singer Jeanie Bryson; and a grandson, Radji Birks Bryson-Barrett.