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Embraceable You

Charlie Parker

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Charlie Parker recorded this tune in New York on October 28, 1947 for Dial Records.

Personnel:

Charlie Parker, alto sax
Miles Davis, trumpet
Duke Jordan, piano
Tommy Potter, bass
Max Roach, drums

Born in Kansas, and raised in Kansas City, Missouri, Charlie Parker started playing the saxophone when he was eleven influenced to some degree by his father who danced and played piano.

After attending high school for only a short time he dropping out and joined the local musicians union becoming completely immersed in jazz by the late 1930s.

In 1938 he joined pianist Jay McShann's band, with whom he would tour destinations including Chicago and New York and make his recording debut.

Early in his career he was given the nick name "Yardbird" or "Bird", a moniker that would stick with him.

Moving to New York City the following year Charlie Parker went on to work with Earl Hines orchestra featuring Dizzy Gillespie.

The young musician undeniable affected by the Kansas City sound of the bands of Bennie Moten and Count Basie, became a leading developer of an entirely new type of jazz that would come to be known as bebop.

He took part in many landmark sessions throughout the 1940s and produced what was later considered "Third Stream" with his November 1949 recording "Charlie Parker with Strings" backed by an orchestra of chamber musicians.

Although wildly successful an ongoing battle with heroin addition greatly stifled Bird's career.

On March 12, 1955 Charlie Parker died of pneumonia in New York at the Stanhope Hotel.

That's how we grow.

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