Jazz Artist of the Week
John Birks Gillespie "Dizzy"
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, composer, and singer. Dizzy Gillespie's contributions to jazz were huge. One of the greatest jazz trumpeters of all time (some would say the best), Gillespie was such a complex player that his contemporaries ended up copying Miles Davis instead, and it was not until Jon Faddis's emergence in the 1970s that Dizzy's style was successfully recreated. Arguably Gillespie is remembered, by both critics and fans alike, as one of the greatest jazz trumpeters of all time.
Gillespie was a trumpet virtuoso and improviser, building on the virtuoso style of Roy Eldridge but adding layers of harmonic omplexity previously unheard in jazz. His beret and horn-rimmed spectacles, his scat-singing, his bent horn, pouched cheeks and his light-hearted personality were essential in popularizing bepob.
Gillespie was a trumpet virtuoso and improviser, building on the virtuoso style of Roy Eldridge but adding layers of harmonic omplexity previously unheard in jazz. His beret and horn-rimmed spectacles, his scat-singing, his bent horn, pouched cheeks and his light-hearted personality were essential in popularizing bepob.
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