This work traces the development of jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker from the musical and cultural environment of Kansas City. Interviews with primary sources provide new information and insight concerning the events and chronology of Parker's early life. Transcription and analysis of five early solos illuminate Parker's improvisational language from the years 1940-42. In these early solos, the most important categories of improvisational techniques include emulations and quotations from various sources. Parker quotes or emulates Lester Young, Roy Eldridge, and popular tunes of the day, demonstrating the importance of the African-American oral and aural transmission of musical vocabulary in the jazz tradition. This work should be especially useful to professionals in areas of jazz saxophone performance, jazz studies, and ethnomusicology.