Donald Eugene Cherry (November 18, 1936 – October 19, 1995) was an American jazz trumpeter. Cherry had a long association with free jazzsaxophonist Ornette Coleman, which began in the late 1950s. Cherry was also a pioneer in world fusion music in the 1960s and 1970s.

Cherry was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, to a mother of Choctaw descent through his maternal grandmother, and an African-American father.His mother and grandmother played piano and his father played trumpet. His father owned Oklahoma City’s Cherry Blossom Club, which hosted performances by Charlie Christian and Fletcher Henderson. In 1940, Cherry moved with his family to Los Angeles, California. He lived in the Wattsneighborhood, and his father tended bar at the Plantation Club on Central Avenue, which at the time was the center of a vibrant jazz scene. Cherry recalled skipping school at Fremont High School in order to play with the swing band at Jefferson High School. This resulted in his transfer to Jacob Riis High School, a reform school, where he first met drummer Billy Higgins.

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