J ohn Birks “Dizzy” Gillespie was born in Cheraw, South Carolina on October 21, 1917. He was an American jazz trumpet virtuoso and improviser, composer, bandleader, and pioneer of bebop music. Gillespie, the youngest of nine children, started to play the piano at the age of four. He also had a variety of other musical instruments available to him from his father who was a local bandleader. By age twelve, he’d taught himself to play the trombone and the trumpet. Jazz trumpeter Roy Eldridge was Gillespie’s inspiration.

At sixteen, Gillespie won a music scholarship to the Laurinburg Institute, a black preparatory school in North Carolina founded in 1904 at the request of Black community leader and educator Booker T. Washington. Gillespie studied there for two years until he moved with his family to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

In 1935, at age eighteen, Gillespie got his first professional job with the Frank Fairfax Orchestra in South Philly. It was there that he was nicknamed Dizzy due to his unpredictable and boisterous personality, along with his flamboyant stage presence. He next joined the Edgar Hayes orchestra, followed by the Teddy Hill orchestra, and later freelanced for other bands. In 1939 he joined Cab Calloway’s orchestra where he recorded one of his earliest compositions, “Pickin’ the Cabbage” in 1940. While with Calloway, Gillespie started writing big band arrangements for Woody Herman, Jimmy Dorsey, and others including Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Earl Hines, and Billy Eckstine.

In the late 1940s, Dizzy Gillespie formed his own orchestra. It was known for complex arrangements and instrumental virtuosity. Their repertoire consisted of the pop approach and Afro-Cuban jazz. He formed several other bands throughout his career but mostly played in small groups from the 1950s onward.

In addition to being known for his music, Gillespie made an impression through his physical appearance. His earlier look incorporated a beret, hornrim glasses, and a goatee, which became the precursor to the beatnik style of the 1950s. Later, he was known for his bent-bell trumpet and enormous puffy cheeks that ballooned when played. His harmonic daring, fast paced playing, and jagged melodies were signature sounds for Gillespie. His augmented eleventh (flat fifth) is now a characteristic sound in modern jazz. He died on January 6, 1993.