Kansas City lightning: the rise and times of Charlie Parker

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Part 1. Born in bleeding Kansas -- Part 2. Infinite plasticity -- Part 3. An apprenticeship in blues and swing -- Part 4. Sorry, but I can't take you.;Throughout his life, Charlie Parker personified the tortured American artist: a revolutionary performer who used his alto saxophone to create a new music known as bebop even as he wrestled with a drug addiction that would lead to his death at the age of thirty-four. Drawing on interviews with peers, collaborators, and family members, Kansas City Lightning recreates Parker's Depression-era childhood; his early days navigating the Kansas City nightlife, inspired by lions like Lester Young and Count Basie; and on to New York, where he began to transcend the music he had mastered. Crouch reveals an ambitious young man torn between music and drugs, between his domineering mother and his impressionable young wife, whose teenage romance with Charlie lies at the bittersweet heart of this story. Part 1. Born in bleeding Kansas -- Part 2. Infinite plasticity -- Part 3. An apprenticeship in blues and swing -- Part 4. Sorry, but I can't take you.