Charlie Parker - The Essence of Charlie Parker

Charles Parker, Jr. (August 29, 1920 ΓΓé¼ΓÇ£ March 12, 1955), famously called Bird or Yardbird, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer.

Parker, with Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, is widely considered one of the most influential of jazz musicians. Parker acquired the nickname "Yardbird" early in his career, and the shortened form "Bird" remained Parker's sobriquet for the rest of his life, inspiring the titles of a number of Parker compositions, such as "Yardbird Suite", "Ornithology" and "Bird of Paradise."

Parker played a leading role in the development of bebop, a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, virtuoso technique, and improvisation based on harmonic structure. Parker's innovative approaches to melody, rhythm, and harmony exercised enormous influence on his contemporaries. Several of Parker's songs have become standards, including "Billie's Bounce", "Anthropology", "Ornithology", and "Confirmation". He introduced revolutionary harmonic ideas including a tonal vocabulary employing 9ths, 11ths and 13ths of chords, rapidly implied passing chords, and new variants of altered chords and chord substitutions. His tone was clean and penetrating, but sweet and plaintive on ballads. Although many Parker recordings demonstrate dazzling virtuosic technique and complex melodic lines ΓΓé¼ΓÇ£ such as "Ko-Ko", "Kim", and "Leap Frog" ΓΓé¼ΓÇ£ he was also one of the great blues players. His themeless blues improvisation "Parker's Mood" represents one of the most deeply affecting recordings in jazz. At various times, Parker fused jazz with other musical styles, from classical to Latin music, blazing paths followed later by others.

Parker was an icon for the hipster subculture and later the Beat generation, personifying the conception of the jazz musician as an uncompromising artist and intellectual, rather than just a popular entertainer. His style ΓΓé¼ΓÇ£ from a rhythmic, harmonic and soloing perspective ΓΓé¼ΓÇ£ influenced countless peers on every instrument.