Who is Mary Lou Williams?

An American jazz pianist, arranger, and composer who started at the Andy Kirk territory band and moved to New York and wrote hundreds of compositions and arrangements and recorded more than one hundred records. She wrote and arranged for Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman, and she was friend, mentor, and teacher to Thelonious Monk and Dizzy Gillespie. She finishes her career as a faculty member at Duke University