The real Charlie Parker: what the movie didn't tell you

Ebony, Jan, 1989 by Marilyn Marshall

What The Movie Didn't Tell You

FOR a man who only lived 34 years, legendary jazz saxophonist Charlie (Bird) Parker crammed a whole lot of living into a short period of time.

It began when he was growing up in Kansas City, Mo., in the '30s. Obsessed with jazz as a teenager, he would sneak around the city's famed nightclubs at all hours of the night to hear the music tht he loved. He dropped out of school at 15, married at 16, became a professional musician at 17, and was a father at 18.

By the time Parker reached his 20s, he was well on his way to becoming a great jazz artist. He eventually became one of the greatest ever, despite a troubled personal life that was plagued by alcohol and drug abuse. Parker's bad habits took such a toll on his health that when he collapsed and died of lobar pneumonia on March 12, 1955, the physician called to the scene estimated his age at between 50 and 60.

Today, nearly 34 years after his death, Parker is arousing more interest than ever due to the widely discussed movie, Bird. Produced and directed by actor and jazz enthusiast Clint Eastwood, it features a critically acclaimed performance by Forest Whitaker in the title role. The film focuses on the last years of Parker's life, including his relationship with his White common-law wife, Chan, and is based on her recollections.

However, some critics and musicians have questioned Eastwood's decision to interpret Parker's life in terms of his relationship with White characters, such as Chan and trumpeter Red Rodney, and to play down the social forces, notably recism, that shaped the saxophonist's life.

The movie also omits some important events in Parker's earlier life and many of the people who were part of tha life--his doting mother, Addie; his childhood sweetheart and first wife, Rebecca, who is Black; his second (late) wife, Geraldine, who was Black; and his third wife, Doris, who is White and whose marriage to Parker was challenged in court; and a number of jazz artists who also knew him well.

Those are the missing links that prompt the question, "Who was the real Charlie Parker?"

First and foremost, he was a brilliant musician who revolutionized jazz. A master of improvisation, Parker played the alto sax as it had never been played before. Jay McShann, the Kansas City bandleader and pianist who hired Parker for his group in 1938, says Parker was so good that, "He not only influenced saxophone players, but influenced trumpet players, bass players, piano players -- everybody."

It was Parker's remarkable talent that made him a star of bebop, the jazz form developed in New York City in the early '40s. Others prominent in the movement included trumpeter Dizzy Gillespi (whose character is featured in Bird), pianists Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk, and drummers Kenny Clarke and Max Roach. Roach, who played with Parker in the '40s, says the saxophonist continues to influence the music world, not just the jazz world. Says Roach: "He's all over the place."

Roach also remembers Parker as a man who enjoyed life as much as he did music. "You could say that Bird was a person who gave all of himself to just about everything that he did," he says. Though Parker often drank heavily and used heroin, some associates say he kept his bad habits to himself. "He drank, but I never saw him drunk," says Roach. He and Gillespie both say they never saw Parker use drugs.

One person who once witnessed Parker's heroin use early in his life was his first wife Rebecca, now a retired dress designer living in a Los Angeles suburb. She recalls that when Parker was 16, he called her upstairs one night as he was leaving for work and asked her to sit on the bed and look in the mirror. She watched as he plunged a needle into his arm. "I screamed and got up, and I said, 'What are you doing?'" she recalls. "He never said a word. He took that tie off [that he had used as a tourniquet] and put it around his neck. Then he put on his jacket and said, 'I'll see you in the morning.'"

Parker had a big appetite, too. About 5' feet 10", he usually weighed around 160, but his weight sometimes ballooned to 200 pounds. McShann remembers his fondness for Kansas City ribs and chili. Rebecca says he liked anything "greasy". Parker also liked chicken, which is thought to be one of the reasons for his nickname "Yardbird," later shortened to "Bird." McShann says that when he first met the saxophonist, a few people already were calling him by his nickname. The name really stuck after an incident that occurred in 1939 while he, Parker and other band members were traveling to an engagement in Nebraska. McShann recalls that, "The car Bird was riding in hit a chicken and Bird told the driver, 'Go back and pick up that yardbird." When they arrived at the home where they were to stay overnight, McShann says Parker "took this bird into these people's home and asked the lady to cook it, and she did."

Those who knew Parker often expected the unexpected from him. A complex man, he could be wise beyond his years one minute, and playful the next. Parker's oldest son Leon, now 50 and living in a Denver suburb, remembers his father as "this kind of chubby, happy-go-lucky guy." Rebecca Parker, Leon's mother, says she was amazed at how quiet her ex-husband could be at times. "I would be running off at the mouth," she says, "and he would just stare. Then, he'd smile." Gillespie and Roach found Parker to be a warm and intelligent man who seldom had an unkind word to say about anyone, and who was well-read and able to talk about any subject.