Late jazz great Dizzy Gillespie was named Wednesday as one of two recipients of a $150,000 Swedish music prize, the world's largest and the equivalent of a Nobel prize for music.
The posthumous announcement that the trumpeter had won a 1993 Polar Music Prize indicated he had been selected by the prize committee prior to his death Jan. 6 in New Jersey at the age of 75.Gillespie and Polish composer-conductor Witold Lutoslawski were named winners of the second annual awards by the Royal Swedish Academy of Music in the absence of a Nobel prize in the field.
In its citation, the prize committee noted Gillespie's role in the evolution of jazz over a period of 50 years.