Dizzy Gillespie was born in 1917 in South Carolina. His father, a local bandleader, encouraged his musical progress. By the time he received a scholarship to study music at college he was already an experienced player on the piano, trombone and trumpet. He left school in 1935 to pursue a career as a musician, inspired by the early bop trumpeter Roy Eldridge. He joined the Frankie Fairfax band in Philadelphia and soon earned the nickname ´Dizzy´ for his comical antics on stage. In 1937 he took Eldridges´s place in the Teddy Hill Band, and in 1939 he joined the Cab Calloway Band, where he began to develop his own style. He left the Calloway Band in 1941 and started to work with Charlie Parker and Thelonius Monk. In late1942 Dizzy joined the Earl Hines Band with Parker and from this band was born ´A Night In Tunisia´, Dizzy´s famous piece that kicked off the Bebop era. From 1945 onwards he led a series of both small and big bands, and toured extensively. As he got older Dizzy lost none of his vigour at the time of his seventy-fifth birthday he played a highly successful four weeks at the Blue Note in Manhattan. He died, revered throughout the world of jazz, in 1993.