Dizzy Gillespie a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz. He taught and influenced many other musicians, including trumpeters Miles Davis, Jon Faddis, Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown, Arturo Sandoval, Lee Morgan, Chuck Mangione, and balladeer Johnny Hartman. Scott Yanow wrote, "Dizzy Gillespie's contributions to jazz were huge. One of the greatest jazz trumpeters of all time, Gillespie was such a complex player that his contemporaries ended up being similar to those of Miles Davis and Fats Navarro instead, and it was not until Jon Faddis's emergence in the 1970s that Dizzy's style was successfully recreated [...] Arguably Gillespie is
Ray Abrams (musician) Ray Abrams (musician) Ray Abrams (January 23, 1920 – July 1992) was an American jazz and jump blues tenor saxophonist, born Ray Abramson in New York City. His younger brother was jazz drummer Lee Abrams. Ray Abrams first worked with Dizzy Gillespie in 1945, toured Europe with Don Redman in 1946 and was with Andy Kirk in 1947. He went back and forth between Kirk and Gillespie for decades. Outside of his work with Gillespie he might be best known for the "Ray Abrams Big Band." Other bands with which he played into the early 1950s include those of Hot