TERRY GROSS, HOST:

Jazz saxophonist Art Pepper was born 100 years ago today. He started on clarinet at age 9 and debuted on record with Stan Kenton at age 18. Pepper had an intensive and creative alto saxophone style that kept his services in demand, but owing to personal problems, he'd drop out of music from time to time. Then in the '70s, after a long hiatus, Art Pepper came roaring back. Our jazz historian Kevin Whitehead has the details.

(SOUNDBITE OF ART PEPPER'S "MAMBO KOYAMA")

KEVIN WHITEHEAD, BYLINE: Art Pepper's tune "Mambo Koyama" from 1978, when the saxophonist was enjoying one of the great jazz comebacks after 15 years laying low. His return would soon get a further boost from his candid autobiography, "Straight Life." As Pepper tells it there, he was an unloved kid, afraid

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