Charlie Christian

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Charlie Christian (Charles Henry Christian, Bonham, Texas, 29 July 1916 – New York City, 2 March 1942) was an American swing and jazz guitarist.

Christian was an important early performer on the electric guitar, and is cited as a key figure in the development of bebop and cool jazz. He gained national exposure as a member of the Benny Goodman Sextet and Orchestra from August 1939 to June 1941. His single string technique combined with amplification helped bring the guitar out of the rhythm section and into the forefront as a solo instrument. John Hammond and George T. Simon called Christian the best improvisational talent of the Swing Era. In the liner notes to the 1972 Columbia album Solo Flight: The Genius of Charlie Christian, Gene Lees writes that “many critics and musicians consider that Christian was one of the founding fathers of bebop, or if not that, at least a precursor to it.”

Christian’s influence reached beyond jazz and swing, and in 1990 Christian was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 2006, the City of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma renamed a street in its Bricktown entertainment district “Charlie Christian Avenue.” Oklahoma City is also the home of an annual jazz festival named for Christian.

Christian was born in Bonham, Texas, but his family moved to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, when he was a small child. Both of his parents were musicians and he had two brothers, Edward, born 1906, and Clarence, born 1911.

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