Dizzy Gillespie won the case, but the jury awarded him only $1000 in view of his high earnings up to that point. In 1951, Gillespie founded his record label, Dee Gee Records; it closed in 1953. On January 6, 1953, he threw a party for his wife Lorraine at Snookie's, a club in Manhattan, where his trumpet's bell got bent upward in an accident, but he liked the sound so much he had a special trumpet made with a 45 degree raised bell, becoming his trademark. In 1956 Gillespie organized a band to go on a State Department tour of the Middle
Marino Marini (musician) six months, meeting Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Kenton and Charlie Ventura. American jazz was also a formative influence. On his return, Marini wrote music for films and revues and played in cabaret in Rome and Naples. In 1954, he placed a newspaper advert seeking “young musicians without experience, singing in tune. If not cheerful, don't apply." From the many applicants he chose Gaetano “Totò” Savio (guitar), Sergio (drums) and Ruggero Cori (bass and vocal) for a quartet, Marini playing piano and occasionally singing solo. This quartet played together from 1954 to 1960, a period regarded as the Marino Marini Quartet’s most