for Dial owner - producer Ross Russell's label was in March 1946, a few months after Bird arrived in Los Angeles from New York. Despite all the radical ideas about rhythm, harmony and sonority in his alto solos here (especially "Night in Tunisia," with its boundless virtuosity and mocking wit), Parker never lost his poise and dancing melodiousness (as is apparent on "Moose the Mooche" and "Yardbird Suite"). Even when his lines dart, there's a nonchalance to his beat that transcends the nervous rhythm section. Alternate takes show the vitality of Charlie Parker's imagination, and his debt to Kansas City mentor Lester Young is never clearer than it is in this session. Taken with the Savoy quintet that produced "Now's the Time" and "Ko-Ko" a few months before, these performances find the twenty-five-year-old Parker at a creative peak similar to Louis Armstrong's exactly two decades earlier.

But L.A. audiences resisted the new music, and Parker's drug problems were getting out of control. In July, a quintet session turned disjointed and incoherent; "Lover Man (Oh, Where Can You Be)," which the saxophonist did not want issued, is painful to hear after the previous high points. After the date, Bird started a fire in his hotel room and ended up in Camarillo state hospital for six months.

When Parker got out of Camarillo in February 1947, he planned to return to the friendly confines of 52nd Street immediately, but Russell worked in a couple of quick studio sessions before Bird's departure. The first, with a rhythm trio led by pianist Erroll Garner, spent most of its time on two vocals by Earl Coleman (a be-bop survivor who's just begun recording again). Of these, the several versions of "Dark Shadows" are most convincing, thanks to Parker's supremacy as a blues player. The instrumental cuts are based on his favorite sources: the chords of "I Got Rhythm" and the blues—"Bird's Nest" and "Cool Blues (Hot Blues)," respectively. Erroll Garner hears music more rigidly, but he remains true to his own unique perspective and never deters the fluent Bird.

The following week, Parker fronted a septet more hooked into his personality, but, as with the sidemen on the "Night in Tunisia" date, the playing of the others gets swallowed up by the leader. Bird's mastery of the blues is awesome on "Carvin' the Bird" and "Relaxin' at Camarillo," the latter of which drummer Kenny Clarke cited as "proving