If a 15-year-old Jon Faddis had never summoned the courage to ask Dizzy Gillespie to sign his massive stack of records at the Monterey Jazz Festival, would Faddis have gone on to develop into “the best ever”? It’s an interesting thought. Ponder it, then see for yourself whether you agree with Dizzy’s evaluation of Faddis. Come celebrate the 60th anniversary of Dizzy Gillespie’s run for president on Oct. 27 at the Handlery Hotel with the Faddis/McPherson Quintet.
By Matt Silver
Here’s a short story — incomplete, certainly, but revealing nevertheless — about how a young trumpeter from Oakland came to be called the best ever…by the best ever.
Trumpeter Jon Faddis met his hero, Dizzy Gillespie, for the first time when he was 12 years old. He was too afraid to say anything.
Just a few years later, a 15-year-old Faddis and his mother traveled from their home in Oakland to the Monterey Jazz Festival, where Dizzy was headlining. This time, Faddis was intent on, if not conversing with Dizzy, at least getting him to sign the 50-or-so Dizzy Gillespie records he’d brought along with him.
“Usually when someone brings records for autographing, you know... they might have three or four records max,” Faddis recalled, laughing, as he recounted the story to Dave Drexler on a recent edition of KSDS’s “Inside Art.” “So Dizzy saw this big stack of records, and he looked at me… and I don’t know what he thought!”
But the enthusiasm for and deep knowledge of the music Faddis demonstrated to Dizzy at such a young age made an impression on the bebop legend.
So much so that not too long after that, when Faddis’s mother once again made the trip from Oakland, this time to San Francisco, so that her son could watch his hero in action, Gillespie intervened in a way that may have changed the course or at least the trajectory of young Jon Faddis’s life.
Dizzy’s band was playing at the legendary Bay Area club, the Jazz Workshop.
“I wasn’t supposed to be allowed into the club because I was underage,” Faddis told Drexler. “But Dizzy vouched for me. And that’s the first time I sat in with Dizzy.”
Faddis didn’t remember the set list that night, but he did remember how he felt.
“I just remember how nervous I was. I remember the room spinning, and I almost felt like I was gonna faint,” he told Drexler. “I had shaky knees and wobbly legs, but I pulled it together.”
That’s when he knew, Faddis said, that trumpet would be his life’s journey.
A few years later, Gillespie would declare Faddis “the best ever, including me.”
So here’s the question: The BEST EVER is coming to our town…. Are you really going to miss it? Join us on Sunday evening, Oct. 27th, when the Jon Faddis and Charles McPherson Quintet celebrate Dizzy Gillespie and the 60th anniversary of his inspiring run for president.
Premium seating, dinner, and VIP food-and-drink packages are still available but going fast. Tickets at jazz88.org/tickets or 619-388-3000.
