A teenage Charlie Parker has a cymbal thrown at him

1937: Number 11 in our series of the 50 key events in the history of jazz musicOne night in 1937, a teenage musician called Charlie Parker joined a queue of players waiting to jam onstage at Kansas City's Reno Club. It was a special occasion. A star guest in the rhythm section was Jo Jones, drummer for Count Basie's Orchestra, one of the biggest swing bands in the US.Charlie Parker thought his moment had come, 16 years old or not. He had been practising an improv method of his own, deploying ke...

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