Wardell Gray (February 13, 1921 – May 25, 1955 Oklahoma City, OK) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Near the Congo Club was the Three Sixes. A young dancer, Jeri Walker, knew Earl Hines, and when the Hines band came through Detroit in late 1943, she persuaded Hines to hire Gray on alto saxophone since there was no tenor saxophone job at the time. This was a break for the 21-year-old, as the Earl Hines Orchestra was not only nationally known but had nurtured the careers of emerging bebop musicians such as Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Although most of them had left when Gray joined, playing with the Hines band was a stimulating experience. He married Jeri Walker in Chicago in September 1945.

In 1955 May 26th he was found on a stretch of desert on the outskirts of Las Vegas^[6] dead with a broken neck. At the age of 34, he died of a heroin overdose.