Julian Cannonball Adderley

Cannonball Adderley
Cannonball (left) and Nat Adderley in 1966
Background information
Birth name	Julian Edwin Adderley
Born	(1928-09-15)September 15, 1928 Tampa, Florida, U.S.
Died	August 8, 1975(1975-08-08) (aged 46) Gary, Indiana, U.S.
Genres	Hard bop, soul jazz, modal jazz, jazz rock
Occupation(s)	Teacher, saxophonist
Instruments	Alto saxophone, soprano saxophone
Years active	1955–1975
Labels	Blue Note, Fantasy, Capitol, Prestige, Riverside
Associated acts	Nat Adderley, Miles Davis, George Duke, Yusef Lateef, Sam Jones, Joe Zawinul, Louis Hayes, Bobby Timmons, Bill Evans

Julian Edwin "Cannonball" Adderley (September 15, 1928 – August 8, 1975) was a jazz alto saxophonist of the hard bop era of the 1950s and 1960s.

Adderley is remembered for his 1966 single "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy", a crossover hit on the pop charts, and for his work with trumpeter Miles Davis, including on the epochal album Kind of Blue (1959). He was the brother of jazz cornetist Nat Adderley, a longtime member of his band.

Originally from Tampa, Florida, Adderley moved to New York in 1955. His nickname derived from "cannibal", a title imposed on him by high school colleagues as a tribute to his voracious appetite.

Cannonball moved to Tallahassee, when his parents obtained teaching positions at Florida A&M University. Both Cannonball and brother Nat played with Ray Charles when Charles lived in Tallahassee during the early 1940s. Adderley moved to Broward County, Florida, in 1948 after finishing his music studies at Tallahassee and became the band director at Dillard High School in Fort Lauderdale, a position which he held until 1950. Cannonball was a local legend in Southeast Florida until he moved to New York City in 1955.

One of his known addresses in New York was in the neighborhood of Corona, Queens. He left Florida originally to seek graduate studies at New York conservatories, but one night in 1955 he brought his saxophone with him to the Café Bohemia. Asked to sit in with Oscar Pettiford in place of his band's regular saxophonist, who was late for the gig, the "buzz" on the New York jazz scene after Adderley's performance announced him as the heir to the mantle of Charlie Parker.