Dave Brubeck
(December 6, 1920 –
Brubeck was born in the San Francisco Bay Area city of Concord. After graduating in 1942, Brubeck was drafted into the army. He volunteered to play piano at a Red Cross show; he was such a hit he was ordered to form a band. Thus he created one of the US armed forces' first racially integrated bands, He returned to college after serving nearly four years in the army, this time attending Mills College in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Brubeck had a career that spanned almost all American jazz since World War II. He formed The Dave Brubeck Quartet in 1951 and was the first modern jazz musician to be pictured on the cover of Time magazine.
