So what do you guys and gals think about Charlie Parker

The greatest improviser in jazz history though his demons got the best of him @ 34.
I'll post more later when I get time.

i've always loved his tone, i think that's what a saxophone should sound like. i enjoy him most of the time, but there's a point when to me, it becomes squawks and squeeks rather than music. i'm not really a BeBop fan

i LOVE this tune... Etta James - MY FUNNY VALENTINE  When i first heard it i was only half listening and i subconsciously thought oh my, that voice is really pitchy... then i began to focus and i loved it.  i can play over and over.  i have about everything she recorded i believe.

I don't know the title of the recording of Parker and his band at Massey Hall in Toronto, but it should be easy to track down, it's stellar.
"Hot Air" is a weekly CBC radio jazz broadcast and they dedicated the entire program to all things Parker on the anniversary of his birthday earlier this year.

I think it's hard for most of us to appreciate Parker's contribution because we are more familiar with the music of the musicians that he inspired. It's a bold statement to say that without Parker we might not have the likes of Miles and Coltrane, who were geniuses in their own right (IMO) -- but Parker cleared the path that led to Hard Bop. What Charlie Parker did had never been done before.

Bird is at a disadvantage in relating to modern consumers in that most of what survives of his work was recorded only a few years before technology made the quantum leap into hi fidelity -- his recordings just don't sound very good. Add to that he usually played the alto sax which is not always a pleasure to listen to when it's abused the way he played it. At that time he wasn't playing to an auditorium of white folks who sat quietly while he wailed. His audience was mostly young black people in crowded dance clubs and he was there to show them a good time -- which by all accounts he did.

I dig him!

There just happens to be a Donna Lee thread going on right now in the Performer's Forum.

My favorite is Grover Washington, Jr. To me he was to sax what Wes was to guitar. He was not afraid to lean into new jazz concepts. We miss you Grover...play Winelight.... done.

This is from Bird With Strings. Afaik he only ventured into more commercial music just the one time.

I never heard of her until I watched the Muscle Shoals doc. It's worth watching. Free with ads.

NEVER HEARD OF ETTA JAMES? Oh wow, one of the greatest female soul singers out there! "I'd Rather Go Blind" is her classic but that is a deep well. We have an Etta James channel on Pandora. Well worth checking out. Then do Mavis Staples, another jewel whose best work came out of Muscle Shoals.

Sat down with one of my TAFE guitar lecturers, yesterday. I still catch up with him on a regular basis, and even play in one of his bands--filling in for their guitarist who's pretty crook at the moment.
Anyway, talk turned to Bird and we started on this one! Not crazy hard, but enough to twist my little mind....the bebop phrasing and getting the fingers to go where you want 'em to...