YARDBIRD Backstage Pass

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Charlie Parker’s Yardbird
A Selected Cultural and Historical Timeline
1959 Jazz trumpeter Miles Davis releases his best-
selling album “Kind of Blue.”
1950 Parker begins living with Chan Richardson. They
never marry.
Charlie Parker performs three nights at Chicago’s Pershing
Hotel Ballroom (64th and Cottage Grove). Recordings are
later released as live albums.
1953 Dizzy Gillespie’s trumpet bell is accidentally bent 45°
and the horn becomes his signature.
1954 Inaugural season of Lyric Opera of Chicago.
Parker’s daughter Pree dies from complications of
cystic fibrosis.
1955 Charlie Parker dies in New York City at the age
of 34 from complications related to drug and alcohol
addiction.
1961 Yardbird composer Daniel Schnyder is born in
Zurich, Switzerland.
Dizzy Gillespie
Addie Parker
1950s 1960s 1970s
1967 Addie Parker, Charlie’s
mother, dies at the age of 75.
1975 Charlie posthumously wins a Grammy for Best
Improvised Solo on the record “First Recordings!”