Charlie Parker vs Jacqueline du Pré
Two music prodigies, compared on what is actually documented: field, era, country and record. No invented numbers.
The record, side by side
| Charlie Parker | Jacqueline du Pré | |
| Field | Music | Music |
| Sub-field | Jazz | Classical |
| Born | 1920 | 1945 |
| Died | 1955 | 1987 |
| Country of birth | United States | United Kingdom |
| Star sign | Virgo | Aquarius |
Who they are
Charlie Parker
Charles Parker Jr. was born on August 29, 1920, in Kansas City, Kansas, and grew up across the river in Kansas City, Missouri, in a city that pulsed with jazz at every hour of the day and night. The Kansas City of Parker's youth was a wide-open town, operating under the corrupt but musically fertile patronage of political boss Tom Pendergast, and the music that thrived there — hard-swinging, blues-drenched, built for all-night cutting sessions — formed the soil in which Parker's genius took root. He began playing alto saxophone at age eleven and joined…
Full biography of Charlie Parker →
Jacqueline du Pré
There is a recording made in 1965, when Jacqueline du Pré was nineteen years old, that classical musicians still use as a reference point for what the cello can express. She was performing Elgar's Cello Concerto in E minor — a late, elegiac work that Elgar wrote in 1919, after the destruction of the First World War, and which had been considered a minor piece of his output until du Pré played it. Her performance — large-scaled, deeply personal, technically sovereign — transformed the concerto's reputation overnight. It is now considered one of the great…
Full biography of Jacqueline du Pré →
What they share
- Both are held here under Music.
- Their lifetimes overlap.
Where they part
- Born in different countries: United States and United Kingdom.
- 25 years separate their births (1920 and 1945).
Questions people ask
- Who came first, Charlie Parker or Jacqueline du Pré?
- Charlie Parker. Charlie Parker was born in 1920, Jacqueline du Pré in 1945.
- What field is each of them in?
- Charlie Parker is filed under Music (Jazz). Jacqueline du Pré is filed under Music (Classical).
- Were they contemporaries?
- Yes - their lifetimes overlap.