- published: 09 May 2014
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Clifford Brown (October 30, 1930 – June 26, 1956), aka "Brownie", was an American jazz trumpeter. He died at the age of 25 in a car accident, leaving behind only four years' worth of recordings. Nonetheless, he had a considerable influence on later jazz trumpet players, including Donald Byrd, Lee Morgan, Booker Little, Arturo Sandoval and Freddie Hubbard. He was also a composer of note: two of his compositions, "Joy Spring" and "Daahoud", have become jazz standards.
Brown won the Down Beat critics' poll for the "New Star of the Year" in 1954; he was inducted into the Down Beat "Jazz Hall of Fame" in 1972 in the critics' poll.
Brown was born into a musical family in a progressive East-Side neighborhood of Wilmington, Delaware. His father organized his four youngest sons, including Brown, into a vocal quartet. Around age ten, Brown started playing trumpet at school after becoming fascinated with the shiny trumpet his father owned. At age thirteen, upon entering senior high, his father bought him his own trumpet and provided him with private lessons. As a junior in high school, he received lessons from Robert Boysie Lowery and played in "a jazz group that Lowery organized." He even began making trips to Philadelphia. Brown took pride in his neighborhood and earned a good education from Howard High.