LET'S HEAR IT FOR DIZZY

[Horatio Hornblower]

Phil Woods observed in an interview that he though Dizzy Gillespie was actually under appreciated by jazz fans and musicians alike. I sort of understand what he means. You hear people talking about Miles, and Freddie, and Woody, and Chet, and Maynard..but not so much Dizzy. THere isn't a Dizzy Gillespie Fan Cite. Am I right to feel this way? For me, Dizzy is such an amazing influence, not only as a trunmpet player, soloist, composer, band leader, architect of a musical style, but a hell of a man.Perhaps it is so obvious, it escapes our attention. I'd love to hear folks talk about their favor Gillespie recordings, or live listenings. Diz was the Man.

[junkyt]

I'll chime in here, even tho some of you may have already heard this story.

dizzy is the whole reason i'm a trumpet player. when i was in second grade, eveyone in my class was made to pick an instrument to play. since i grew up in a house that was almost exclusively flooded with classical music, i had decided to become a cello player. i still love the cello, and one of these days i'd still like to learn to play it. but, about a week before we had to make our final decision, we were all assembled in the multi-purpose room (remember those???) for what became a life-changing experience for me. we were told that some musicians had come to play for us. well, the musicians were dizzy and his band. to this day, i have no idea how this came about, but i sat there and worshipped this huge man in a dashiki with his cheeks puffed out, and then and there decided to hell with the cello, i want to do that!

as for favorite recordings, i still go back to the 'bird & diz' album. the cuts are short, but the playing is phenomenal.

long live dizzy!!!
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[junkyt]

two more great dizzy recordings:

swing low sweet cadillac, with james moody. diz and moody get into a mumbles contest which is truly hysterical.

jazz casual...i bought the dvd of this, and the performance, with lalo schiffren and leo wright is awesome!
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[_Japle]

I have a LOT of Dizzy's CDs. He was a fantastically influential musician.

Dizzy, in the opinion of many jazz historians, was more responsible for bebop than Charlie Parker. Dizzy was playing in more groups with more bebop innovators in the early '40s than Bird. Bird gets more credit, but he died young and they made a fairly inaccurate movie about him.
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John
Cape Canaveral

[trjeam]

I agree that Diz does get his credit for his contribution to bebop. The guy was a freaking genius. I have a recording of him playing manteca and that band was just rockin. The lines that Diz comes up are truly amazing. Allot of people try to imitate Diz by playing fast runs like Diz but if you listen closely there is something deep and meaningful in every single Diz solo. I can't explain what he did but it is amazing. I have a CD that someone gave me called "For Musicians Only" and the lines that Diz comes up with are ridiculous I just sit back and enjoy and only hope that one day I can express my self as well as he did.
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Jorge Ayala Jr: Trumpeter/Producer
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[_Don Herman]

I attended a clinic of sorts, more like an interactive talk, Dizzy gave before a performance in the LA area some time ago. He was warm, wonderful, and funny as all get out. He had some great quips (few of which I can remember, alas) about playing and life in general.

One of the things he does is to play with nice full sound, well rounded "full" notes, and very distinct, clean articulation -- 'way up high. He played some riffs and runs that had him just pecking away at notes that seemed in the easy mid to upper middle register, in and just over the staff. Wasn't 'til I got home that I realized those little runs were going well over high C, to high G and a little over, but it sounded like he was just quickly tounging a fast little riff in the staff! An amazing guy...

Here's a quote I do remember: "May your horn be hot and your sound be cool!"

Ah, memories - Don
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Don Herman/Monument, CO
"After silence, that which best expresses the inexpressible, is music." - Aldous Huxley

[Jerry Freedman]

I think the reason that Dizzy gets left out of the jazz trumpet pantheon is that, for mortals like us, Dizzy represents totally unattainable. We tend to think ( erroneously) that with enough practice we could sound like C. Brown or Hubbard, but no amount of practice would get anybody to Dizzy's level. In "Genius", the biography of Feynman, Glieck quotes someone on the definitions of genius -- there is the normal kind which we could imagine ourselves aspiring to if we were 100 times better and there is the magician, like Feynman who pulled it out of thin air. Dizzy was such a magician

[CRJAZZMAN]

When I finally moved out of my Maynard stage, Diz is the main influence I checked out other than Miles. Then came Lee Morgan and I was on my way. But Diz blows my mind! I have the 3 disk set Dizzy's Diamonds. Love it. Can't get enough! I have to echo a previous post about his range. He plays so well up high and articulates so freely that you are unaware he is playing OVER an octave above the staff!
I can't believe there is not even one tribute website out there? I guess we can always count on his page at trumpetstuff www.trumpetstuff.com for our fix!
_________________
Matt Canfield
Can email me at crjazzman@yahoo.com
I do not check the email address listed in my profile.
King Legend .462 in silver
Bobby Shew Lead and Flugel mpcs

[trumpetgeekjr]

Not only does Diz' not get enough credit. But the DIZZY GILLESPIE Big Band is the 'swingin-est' big band on recording till this day.No one ever says this. Everyone says Buddy, Basie, Thad & Mel, Duke...... I never hear them speak of DIZ's big band. NEVER!!
And why is it that this band was never recorded porperly? I mean, this band was FULL of all-stars in every chair. Still, the sound quality from these sessions STINKS. But that band SWUNG!!!!!
"PROPS FOR DIZ"!!

[JAZZ-PLAYER-COLLECTOR]

I could tell quite a few stories about Dizzy, but here's a short glimpse
of the man. I first met Dizzy in '79 when we both played at the Sao Palo
Jazz Festival in Brazil. He had just gotten off an eight hour flight and was
dead tired. He and his band (an Afro-Cuban Jazz combo) walked into the
hotel where we were all staying together, and he was immediately
mobed by about fifty fans and musicians alike.

Dizzy was surrounded by people wanting autographs and such. I just
stayed back, out of respect, feeling like everyone should give him some
space. He was scheduled to be the guest artist with a group I was playing
in at the time, as well as do his own show later. After most of the crowd
got their autographs, which Dizzy kindly did for each person who asked,
the guys in my band were the last ones to still be hanging around.

Since I was the jazz trumpeter in the band, Dizzy pulled me aside for a
while, as we would be doing some trading fours together on a couple of
tunes. I was just a kid in my twenties at the time, and I guess Diz knew
I'd be nervous. He put his hand on my shoulder as we talked, and he was
so amazingly friendly, I couldn't believe it. He took his time with me and
we talked for about twenty minutes I'd guess, but I'll never forget how
relaxed he made me feel. We talked about the solos we'd share and how
they would go smoothly if I didn't try to imitate him, but just do my own
thing. He made me feel so at ease, he made me feel like I was just one
of his old friends.

He also gave me other great advice that day too, which I never forgot.
He stressed one point with me more than any other though. He said the
most valuable thing any jazz trumpeter could ever do is to learn to play
the piano. He talked about how theory could be so much more easily
visualized on the keyboard, and how it was just too abstract for a guy
who only played the trumpet. I remember years later seeing him on a
video, saying how he'd once given Miles Davis the exact same advice! I
guess I wasn't the only one to get this advice from Dizzy, but I've surely
followed it, and I have always stressed this with all my students too.

As it turned out, we didn't actually wind up getting to play together on that
show. I think there was just too little time, or some kind of scheduling foul
up. But the time I spent with Dizzy seemed to make up for it all. He later
hung out with the guys in our band quite a bit at the theatre, and at the
hotel too. Every single time anyone came up to him, and asked for an
autograph, or to get their picture taken with him or whatever, he always
stopped whatever he was doing and gave his time freely, and he always
made a point of adding a few kind words. He just gave of himself fully
and freely to every single person he came in contact with.

Of course we all know that his genius has few rivals, but I just wanted to
share my first hand accounts of the warmth, kindness, and generosity of
the man behind the legend. The first record I ever owned was, "Have
Trumpet, Will Excite", so I was always in awe of his music, but he should
always be remembered for what a great human being he was too!

Just my thoughts on a great man...
Tom in Texas, JAZZ-PLAYER-COLLECTOR
_________________
7 Monettes, 9 Taylors, 8 Courtois, 8 Stomvis
7 Lawlers, 4 Leblancs, 3 Bessons, 3 Kanstuls
2 Blackburns, 9 Schilkes, 8 Bachs, 5 Selmers
8 Yamahas, 5 Committees, 2 Edwards Gen X
4 Marcinkeiwicz, 9 Harrelsons, and 4 Eclipses

[AccentOnTrumpet]

I hate to say this, but maybe there was a movie about Bird and not Dizzy because of Bird's lifestyle.

Dizzy was pretty clean I believe, and didn't do all of that crap that Bird did. Unfortunately in our society, more people are interested in seeing a movie about how Bird lived than how dizzy did. Also, dieing young has a lot to do with it, Dizzy outlived Bird by almost forty years.

Not taking anything away from Bird, but Dizzy deserves just as much recognition as he does.

[Horatio Hornblower]

Someone in the NY times recently wrote to say that Beethoven was to blame for the archtype of the "tortured', "angry".."misthanthropic" artist, and that his behavior was codified because of the staggering genius of his music. The same can be said of Charlie Parker. Certain people are drawn to the more lurid aspects of his life...but there was much more than that. Conversly, one can read about the life and times of Dizzy Gillespie and through that lense and through those stories, gain interesting perspectives of history, society, art, pop culture, the war years, fads, African American studies, obviously music, music criticism, interpersonal relationships..you name it...and of course there is the story of the man himself, which is as complicated and interesting as any biography of a public figure. It all depends on the way the story is told, and the abilities of the one telling the story. Dizzy's story is a rich one, and we would all do well to study his and others like him.

[CRJAZZMAN]

CHECK IT OUT!
http://www.jazzatlincolncenter.org/dccc/index.htm
Looks like Dizzy's gettin' some love!
_________________
Matt Canfield
Can email me at crjazzman@yahoo.com
I do not check the email address listed in my profile.
King Legend .462 in silver
Bobby Shew Lead and Flugel mpcs