In death, as in life, jazz giant Charlie Parker apparently cannot find peace.
After he died in New York — on March 12, 1955, at age 34 — his body was shipped to Kansas City, Mo., against his wishes, according to Chan Parker, his common-law wife at the time. Though some observers dispute Parker’s unwillingness to be buried in the city where he grew up, this was just the start of the problems.
The original headstone for Parker’s grave carried the wrong death date (March 23) and the obituary in Parker’s hometown newspaper, the Kansas City Star, misspelled the great musician’s name as “Charley.”
Over time, the comedy (or tragedy) of errors gained momentum. In 1992, vandals stole the gravemarker, but the new one (installed in 1994) carries the image of a tenor saxophone — Parker made his name playing alto.
So when news broke last the plan have their way, a new gravesite and memorial would be created near 18th and Vine, the fabled Kansas City jazz intersection where the music flourished in the ’30s. Because the city opened its Jazz Museum at that location last year, the site might be a natural.
“Moving Charlie Parker’s grave accomplishes two things,” says Mike Metheny, editor of Kansas City-based JAM Magazine and a proponent of the idea. “It’s a chance to rectify that typo (the tenor saxophone), and it moves Charlie Parker to a place of prominence and dignity.”
The place where Bird now rests, Lincoln Cemetery, stands at the outskirts of the city and has proven remote for visitors wishing to honor the musician’s memory. In addition, the site “is desolate and not kept up,” Metheny says. “It’s a forlorn and sad-looking sight. I have a feeling in 1955 it might have been a nice place, but it isn’t anymore.”
Parker’s mother, Addie, had picked the location — under a tree and overlooking a hill — and she rests buried next to him, as she always wished (planners have not yet determined whether her grave would be moved with his).
The idea of moving Parker’s remains to the center of the city’s reawakening entertainment district has not been a hit in all quarters.
“There are better places to bury the dead,” Kansas City Councilman Ed Ford told the Kansas City Star last week, after the council rejected a proposal from Mayor Emanuel Cleaver for $25,000 to move the grave. Nevertheless, backers of the plan have begun raising the funds privately and communicating with one of Parker’s sons, Leon.
Behind the scenes, plans are afoot to erect a sculpture of Bird at the proposed gravesite, with an anonymous donor recently pledging approximately $250,000 to commission a major sculptor for the job.
“It will be much more than just a grave — it will be a shrine,” says Cleaver. “It will take up about half a block behind the museum. I believe having Charlie Parker’s grave near the museum is almost as important as having the home base near the playing field.”
Cleaver is not known for dreaming small. He spent $140,000 of the city’s money to acquire Parker’s famous Massey Hall alto saxophone in 1994, though he was lambasted in the local press for the move. Nevertheless, Cleaver pushed ahead to build the $12 million Kansas City Jazz Museum, with Parker’s alto now serving as the crown jewel of a collection that has attracted international attention.
“When we opened the Jazz Museum last year, we had people come in from as far away as Tokyo and Italy,” says Cleaver, “and they all wanted to go to Charlie Parker’s grave. It ought to be near the museum.”
History may never know for sure where Parker wanted to be buried, though Parker’s widow, Doris Parker, strongly disagrees that the musician wanted to steer clear of K.C.
“I’ve only heard one person say that Charlie didn’t want to be buried in Kansas City, and that’s Chan,” says Doris Parker, who lives in New York. “I never heard him say that. He dearly loved his mother, and I cannot believe he would not want to be near his mother.
“So I’m all for the plan, provided they move his mother also. I don’t want her left on that hill alone.”
Should the graves be moved to the site of America’s first major jazz museum and on the street where a jazz genius learned his art, Charlie Parker and his mother never would be alone again — jazz pilgrims from around the world would flock there evermore.
