2. uncountable noun [oft in NOUN] Distress is the state of being in extreme danger and needing urgent help. He expressed concern that the ship might be in distress. The constable received a distress call, and saw two youths attacking his colleague. Synonyms: danger, risk, difficulty, peril More Synonyms of distress.
But Dizzy Gillespie -- born John Birks Gillespie in Cheraw, S.C., on Oct. 21, 1917 -- saw himself primarily as a player. I always thought I was a musician, he told Musician magazine's Chip Stern a year ago. Thought I was a musician before I really was a musician..
King Oliver Biography. Born May 11, 1885, in New Orleans (some sources say Donaldsville), LA; died April 8, 1938, in Savannah, GA. Billed as the World's Greatest Cornetist, Joe King Oliver reigned as the premier trumpeter of jazz during the early 1920s. The famed musical mentor of Louis Armstrong, Oliver is perhaps best remembered for bringing the young New Orleans hornman to Chicago in 1922.