The life and legends of Charlie Parker, told through the perspectives of those who knew him: a brother, a fellow artist, a photographer, a lover, a student, and a record store owner.

Priestley offers new insight into Parker's career, beginning as a teenager single-mindedly devoted to mastering the saxophone through his death at 34 in such wretched condition that the doctor listed his age as 53.

What begins as one woman’s search for her own artistic courage unravels into a stunning look into what jazz music can teach out about our search for the truest version of ourselves. For decades, seasoned players on the scene have spoken in whispered tones about The Blue: a mysterious meeting place for jazz history - a place where ghosts from this music's storied past spring to life for those courageous enough to enter. When Jessie Choi's mentor Jimmy Hightower collapses at a gig and loses consciousness, she finds herself reluctantly pulled back into the jazz scene she abandoned years earlier. In investigating the music and mystery behind Jimmy's comatose state, every thread leads to the same question: is Jimmy somehow trapped in this enigma known as The Blue? In her search to save her teacher, Jessie rubs shoulders with legends, uncovers the secret history of Blue Note Records, and faces her own deepest fears.

A memoir of the Jazz Age and a life profoundly influenced by it My Life in E-flat is the remarkable memoir of a woman who witnessed some of the most important movements in the history of jazz. Through her autobiography, Chan Parker provides intimate insights into the music and into life with Charlie Parker, the key figure in the development of bebop and one of the most important of all jazz musicians. Born Beverly Dolores Berg in New York City at the height of the Jazz Age, Parker's father was a producer of vaudeville shows and her mother was a dancer in Florenz Ziegfeld's Midnight Frolic. Parker became part of the jazz culture as a nightclub dancer and later as the wife of jazz saxophonists Charlie Parker and then Phil Woods. In a moving and candid portrait of Charlie Parker, the author describes in harrowing detail a man of incredible talent besieged with addictions and self-destructiveness. She painfully recounts his death at the age of 35 while married to her and its effect on her life as well as on the musical world. Parker's honest portrait of one of the most gifted musicians in jazz provides unique insight into the history of the music and the difficulties faced by African American performers during the 1940s. Parker also reflects on her struggle to find her own voice and on her work with Clint Eastwood on the film biography of Charlie Parker, Bird (1988).

The first biography of one of the most influential but unheralded musicians in jazz history

(Fake Book). Features 57 signature songs that this bebop genius either composed or co-wrote, all in Real Book style! Includes: Anthropology * Billie's Bounce (Bill's Bounce) * The Bird * Bird of Paradise * Blues for Alice * Confirmation * Donna Lee * Kim * Ko Ko * Moose the Mooche * Now's the Time * Ornithology * Parker's Mood * Scrapple from the Apple * Shawnuff * Yardbird Suite * and more. All Hal Leonard Real Books feature time-tested songs in accurate arrangements in the famous easy-to-read, hand-written notation.