Terry Gross

The Emmy and Tony award-winning actor talks about growing up gay in Tennessee, losing theater friends during the AIDS epidemic and playing the head of a family-owned media group on Succession.

Fresh Air listens back to archival interviews with Max Roach and trumpeter Red Rodney, two musicians who played with Parker; and alto saxophonist Jackie McLean, who considered Parker a mentor.

More blues singer than Broadway, the Bird helped introduce bebop to jazz — and along the way redefined jazz velocity with his scrappy sound and pithy melodic figures.