Brown was born in Wilmington, Del., on Oct. 30, 1930. He studied trumpet
under two noted music teachers, Harry Andrews and Robert Boysie. Through
their guidance and his own dedication he developed the flawless conservatory-like facility that astounded listeners and musicians alike. He continued his musical training while studying mathematics at Maryland and Delaware State Colleges. In Philadelphia, Brown gigged and jammed in the
city's jazz clubs where he met Gillespie and Navarro-who were impressed with his budding genius.

After a near-fatal car accident in 1950, Brown first appeared on a  record as a  sideman for Chris Powell's Blue Flames and with arranger  in1952. Also in '52, he joined Lionel Hampton's Orchestra, which also featured trumpeters Quincy Jones and Art Farmer, for a European tour.

One year later, Brown became a founding member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers with Horace Silver and Lou Donaldson. As a reaction to the flaccid excesses of the "cool sound," Brown and company emphasized a driving, hard-edged sound, coining "hard-bop" as evidenced by thehistoric1954 live date, A Night At Birdland. Recording for the  ,  LP as a leader was his orchestra-backed ballad album, Clifford Brown With Strings. He wrote two harp-bop standards, "Sandu" and"Joy Spring," and he formed a combo with Roach that also featured saxophonists Harold Land and Sonny Rollins. On June 26, 1956, Brown and his band mate,
pianist Richie Powell-the younger brother of the legendary pianist Bud-werekilled in an automobile accident. Brown's Gabriel-inspired muse has influenced a number of trumpeters including Freddie Hubbard, Woody Shawand Wynton Marsalis.

In 1972, Brown was elected by the Critics into the Down Beat Hall of Fame.Today, his art of life served as the inspiration for the Tony award-winning Broadway play, Sideman.

Born on Dec. 9, 1932 in Detroit, Byrd studied trumpet and composition and attended Cass Tech High School and graduated from Wayne State University in 1954. After leading several bands during his stint in the military, Byrd studied with the classical teacher Nadia Boulanger. He arrived in New York in 1955 and worked with Sonny Rollins, Max Roach and Thelonious Monk. He co-led a combo with alto saxophonist Gigi Gryce and recorded for the Delmark label. His big break was with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers in the mid '50s, where he was the vital link from Clifford Brown to Lee Morgan. In 1959, after he left the Jazz Messengers, Byrd discovered Herbie Hancock in Chicago and recorded a number impressive dates for Bethlehem, Columbia and Blue Note in the '60s, including Free Form and New Perspectives, with the gospel-tinged hit, "Cristo Rendentor." He also discovered composer Duke Pearson during that period.

From 1973, Byrd helped launch the jazz/funk era with his seminal albums, Black Byrd, Street Lady and Places and Spaces. Byrd created and produced The Blackbyrds, a combo composed of musicians he taught at Howard University in the early '70s. Byrd also repeated that formula with N.C.C.U from North Carolina Central University. After several funk forays in the early '80s on Elektra records, Byrd suffered a stroke and rehabilitated himself to record a few straightahead projects for the Landmark label. Byrd was one of the first jazz artists to embrace rap music and he appeared on the release Jazzmatazz Vol. I featuring the rapper Guru of Gangstarr.

A recipient of a Masters of Arts Degree from the Manhattan School of Music, Byrd started jazz programs at Oberlin and Queens College. Throughout his career, Byrd's musical motto has been: Have groove, will travel.

Born in Badin, N.C., on Nov. 1, 1926, Donaldson graduated from North Carolina A&T University with a degree in political science. He played in Navy bands during World War II, returned home, then moved to New York City in 1950. He soon recorded with Thelonious Monk and Milt Jackson, as well as making records under his own name starting in 1952. He also worked for a time with Art Blakey in the original 1954 version of the Jazz Messengers and later for Charles Mingus before largely leading his own groups for the rest of his long career. Into the '90s, he has toured eight months of each year in the United States, Europe and Japan.

His role in the soul jazz movement became somewhat solidified when he started to use an organist in place of the customary pianist in his groups, which also included a trumpeter, guitarist and drummer. Among his best recordings, all on Blue Note, are Blues Walk, Midnight Creeper and Sunny Side Up. His most widely known tunes have included Alligator Boogaloo and Funky Mama. In the '90s, Donaldson has recorded for the Columbia and Milestone labels with sidemen such as Dr. Lonnie Smith and Peter Bernstein. His alma mater currently awards a Lou Donaldson Scholarship for Music Excellence.

Born Aug. 30, 1924, in Fairfield, Texas, Dorham took piano lessons from the age of 7, then shifted to trumpet in high school in Austin. He entered the Army in 1942, where he was on the boxing team, and starting playing with Russell Jacquet in 1943. From the mid to late '40s he worked with Billy Eckstine, Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton and Mercer Ellington, then was the replacement for Miles Davis in Charlie Parker's combo for several years.

Dorham played around New York City in the early '50s, then became one of the founding members of the Jazz Messengers. He later replaced Clifford Brown in Max Roach's combo when Brown was killed in a car crash. Dorham continued to lead his own groups (including one that featured Joe Henderson) and worked and recorded on his own and with others until his death due to liver failure Dec. 5, 1972. His best recordings include Whistle Stop and Una Mas for Blue Note and Jazz Contemporary for Time.

Will Smith

By the mid-1960s Golson had left the jazz world to work as a television score composer -- he wrote the themes to "Mission Impossible," "M*A*S*H" and "The Partridge Family" -- and professional arranger (working with Diana Ross, Lou Rawls, David Sanborn, Ella Fitzgerald, and others). Around 1977 Golson returned to performing, recording a string of well-received albums for various record labels. In the 1990s Golson wrote a symphony that was performed at the Lincoln Center, served as scholar-in-residence at William Patterson College, won a Guggenheim Fellowship and wrote a college textbook. His most recent CD, Up Jumped Benny, was released on the Arkadia Jazz label.

By the mid '50s, Gordon was playing with Art Blakey (1954), Don Redman (1955) and the Dizzy Gillespie Big Band (1956), taking Donald Byrd's trumpet chair in Horace Silver's band in 1956. By the late '50s, he was playing with Herb Pomeroy (1957-'58), eventually moving to Los Angeles, where he started to record in earnest with the likes of Benny Carter, Thelonious Monk, Barney Kessel, Harold Land and Shelly Manne. Gordon stayed on as a member of Shelly Manne & His Men from 1958-'60.

Gordon's life ended tragically, when he died after being burned in a fire on Nov. 4, 1963. He was working as a freelancer at the time. Gordon can best be heard with Shelly Manne & His Men on the five individually released CDs of At The Blackhawk recordings (Contemporary/OJC, 1959), which also feature Richie Kamuca, Victor Feldman and Monty Budwig.

Perhaps it was this early, competitive cauldron that sparked Johnny Griffin to become a competitive, racehorse improviser; whatever it was, Griffin soon earned the nickname, "fastest tenor in the West."

Griffin was born April 24, 1928, in Chicago, and began studying clarinet in 1941. After his stint with Hamp, he worked on the East Coast with an r&b band led by Joe Morris, and with a variety of other players, including both of the drumming Joneses -- Philly Joe and Jo -- Percy Heath and Gene Ramey. He also hung out extensively with Thelonious Monk and Bud Powell during this period, absorbing their musical ideas. In 1957, after a stretch in the Army, Griffin joined Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, then replaced John Coltrane in Monk's group in 1958. For two years, he led a "tough tenors" quintet with Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis. In 1963 Griffin moved to Europe, settling first in Paris, then the Netherlands and finally in Southern France, where he remains. In Paris, Griffin performed at the Blue Note with other expatriates, including Bud Powell and Kenny Clarke; and from 1967-'69 he was a soloist in the Clarke-Boland Big Band. Griffin continues to tour internationally.

Griffin attacks standards, particularly war-horses such as "All the Things You Are" with ferocious strings of ideas. Withal, he still maintains a warm, round, personal and well-seasoned sound. In his later years, he became as accomplished on ballads as uptempo numbers.

The film The Jazz Life Featuring Johnny Griffin features a performance from the 1980s at the Village Vanguard in New York.

Recommended recordings: Johnny Griffin Sextet (OJC).

McLean was born on May 17, 1932, in New York. He began playing the saxophone when he was 15 and shortly afterwards played with Sonny Rollins (1948-'49). During the next 10 years, he worked with Miles Davis, Paul Bley and Charles Mingus, and was also a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers before forming his own quintet in 1958. On such records as 4,5, And 6 and Swing Swang Swingin', McLean displayed a heavy Charlie Parker influence, but maintained his own approach to rhythm and feeling for the blues. He also wrote the standards "Dig" and "Hip Strut" and acted in the play The Connection from 1959 to 1961. While he received inspiration from the innovators of the late '50s and early '60s, McLean released New Soil, One Step Beyond, Destination...Out! and New And Old Gospel. These records featured his own increasingly complex writing and Gospel included Ornette Coleman on trumpet. In 1968, McLean began teaching at the University of Hartford in Connecticut.

Currently, McLean continues to teach and tour worldwide, often leading groups with his son, saxophonist Rene McLean.

Recommended recordings: One Step Beyond (Blue Note 46821); 4,5, And 6 (Original Jazz Classics 354).

Aaron Cohen

"Not a big sound, not a small sound, but a round sound," is the personal ideal Mobley described to jazz writer John Litweiler.

Mobley was born on July 7, 1930, in Eastman, Ga. He played in a New Jersey r&b band in 1951 when Max Roach discovered and recruited him. After working with Roach, Tadd Dameron, and Dizzy Gillespie, he joined the Horace Silver quartet in 1954. This group became part of the Jazz Messengers and the members backed Mobley when he began leading his own recording sessions beginning in the mid-'50s. During the early '60s, he recorded two of his definitive Blue Note albums, No Room For Squares and Soul Station. He also worked with Miles Davis, Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham and Elvin Jones. In the early '70s, he co-led a quartet with Cedar Walton. For a brief little-known period in Chicago, he composed for Muhal Richard Abrams' AACM Big Band. Plagued by various health problems, Mobley retired from music in 1975. Four years later, his excellent 1966 recording, A Slice Of The Top (Blue Note), was released for the first time. He appeared briefly with Duke Jordan in 1986, but died that year of double pneumonia on May 30.

Recommended recordings: Soul Station (Blue Note); No Room For Squares (Blue Note 84149).

Born July 10, 1938, in Philadelphia into a musical family, Morgan studied privately and began playing professionally by the age of 15. In the summer of 1956 he joined Dizzy Gillespie's big band, a gig he kept until 1958 when he joined Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. Also in '56, Morgan recorded his first session for Blue Note, Presenting Lee Morgan, his first of nearly 30 albums for the label. He returned to Philly in 1961 to work with saxophonist Jimmy Heath, among others, and went to New York in 1963 to focus on recording for Blue Note. After another stint with Blakey from 1964-'65, he worked solely as a frontman.

With Blue Note, Morgan's largest success was 1963's Sidewinder, followed by notable albums such as Search For The New Land, Cornbread and Delightfulee. In addition to his frontman work, Morgan appeared as a sideman on classic jazz albums such as Gillespie's Night In Tunisia, Blakey's Moanin', John Coltrane's Blue Trane, Grachan Moncur's Evolution and dates for others, including Curtis Fuller, Philly Joe Jones, Wynton Kelly, Clifford Jordan, Hank Mobley and Wayne Shorter.

Morgan's death, at only 33, has its place in jazz lore. A girlfriend of his at the time, Helen More, shot him on the stage of the New York City nightclub Slug's on Feb. 19, 1972. After the two had an argument, More left the club, returned with a gun and shot him in the heart. Morgan died on the spot.

In 1991, Morgan was inducted by the Readers into the Down Beat Hall of Fame.

Shorter's solo career began modestly in the wake of his departure from the Blakey band, and before joining Miles Davis' quintet in September 1964. From '64-'70, Shorter would contribute mightily to the Davis book, composing and playing some of the band's best music. It was toward the end of his tenure with Davis that he took up the soprano saxophone. He also continued his work as a leader in his own right, making a number of stellar albums for Blue Note. In 1970, Shorter and Zawinul formed Weather Report, a band that stayed together with varying personnel until the mid-'80s.

While co-leading Weather Report, Shorter also played in various side projects, including V.S.O.P., a band that included Herbie Hancock, Tony Williams, Ron Carter and, at different times, Freddie Hubbard and Wynton Marsalis. He also worked as a sideman for such pop artists as Joni Mitchell. His pop collaborations continued through the 1980s into the '90s with not only Mitchell but others like Carlos Santana. Shorter appeared as an actor and player in the important jazz movie Round Midnight in 1986. He has formed various groups during this period that offer a blend of his eclectic tastes, always emphasizing his unique, idiosyncratic writing style and definitive saxophone stylings along, usually in an electronic setting. He currently records and tours with Hancock in a duo setting ('98-'99).

Recordings include: High Life (Verve, 1995), Atlantis (Columbia, 1985), JuJu (Blue Note, 1964). With Weather Report: Heavy Weather (Columbia, 1976), Black Market (Columbia, 1976), Tale Spinnin (Columbia, 1975), I Sing The Body Electric (Columbia, 1971-72). With Miles Davis: Bitches Brew (Columbia, 1969), Sorcerer (Columbia, 1967), Nefertiti (Columbia, 1967), Miles Smiles (Columbia, 1966), Live At The Plugged Nickel (Columbia, 1965), E.S.P. (Columbia, 1965). With Herbie Hancock: 1 + 1 (Verve, 1997). With Art Blakey: Free For All (Blue Note, 1964), Meet You At The Jazz Corner Of The World (Blue Note, 1960)John Ephland

Born in Norwalk, Conn., on Sept. 2, 1928, Silver grew up listening to the folk music of Cape Verde, as his father was from this Afro-Portuguese nation. He also absorbed the popular jazz, blues and gospel music of the day. He played both saxophone and piano in high school, influenced by Thelonious Monk and Bud Powell. He was hired by Stan Getz in 1950 and worked with him for one year. During this time, his boppish compositions "Split Kick" and "Potter's Luck" previewed his gifts as a writer.

After moving to New York in 1951, Silver played and recorded with a number of jazz stars, including Miles Davis, Milt Jackson, Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins. He made his first record as a leader with Lou Donaldson in 1952 for Blue Note, which marked a relationship with the label that lasted 28 years. Silver worked with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers in 1953, and the group's back-to-basics approach was the start of the hard-bop era. Silver's profile as a leader and composer rose for the next two decades, especially with his signature tunes including, "Doodlin'," "Opus De Funk," "Sister Sadie" and his 1964 Cape Verdean/Bossa Nova hit, "Song For My Father." Similar to Blakey's band, his own group became a breeding ground for young talent, including the Brecker Brothers, Joe Henderson, Woody Shaw and Benny Golson. He started his own label in the '80s, Silveto, which quickly folded. Today, he records for GRP.

In 1996, Silver was elected by the Readers into the Down Beat Hall of Fame.