Walter Henri Dyett was born in 1901.  As his father was a minister, the family moved around quite a bit eventually settling in California.  Walter began studying the violin, becoming concertmaster of his high school orchestra in Pasadena.  He entered premedical school at Cal/Berkeley, also joining the university symphony.  Music won out over medicine, and, in 1921, he relocated to Chicago.  By the mid-20's Dyett, was playing with Erskine Tate and conducting orchestras at the Pickford Vaudeville theaters. He also spent time as director of an Army band thereby acquiring the lifelong moniker, "Captain."  In 1931, Walter Dyett became band director at Wendell Phillips High School in Chicago and later moved to DuSable High School when it opened in 1935. 

Captain Dyett’s programs at Phillips and DuSable consisted of what one would expect at any big city comprehensive high school: beginning band, concert band, marching band, and ROTC band, with the notable addition of what he called "Booster Band" and "Booster Orchestra."  In reality,  Booster band was a jazz band, and booster orchestra was what we probably now would call a pit orchestra.  One must remember he couldn't use the word "jazz" in those days because it was considered improper in an academic environment.  So, whereas his later counterparts in a similar situation used "stage band," "lab band," etc., he used "booster band."  The booster band/orchestra played for school dances, special assemblies, and, beginning in 1936, for an annual show called the Hi-Jinks, which was a vaudeville type production of a very high caliber which attracted a huge following in the community.  Dyett wrote and arranged most of the music featuring the singing, dancing, and theatrical talents of the student body, with the booster orchestra in the pit.  It was especially the pit experience that his students later credited for sharpening their skills in preparation for a career in music. 

The list of successful musicians who passed through Captain Walter Dyett’s program at Phillips and DuSable is quite astounding.  Saxophonists Gene Ammons, Von Freeman, Joseph Jarman, John Gilmore, Clifford Jordan, and Johnny Griffin.  Trumpeters Sonny Cohn, who was for years in the Count Basie band.  Trombonist Julian Priesterand.  Violinist Leroy Jenkins.  Pianists Dorothy Donegan and Nat Cole.   Bass player Wilbur Ware, Richard Davis, and Fred Hopkins.  Drummers Wilbur Campbell, Walter Perkins, and Jerome Cooper.  Vocalists Dinah Washington, Johnny Hartman, and, Nat Cole.  Also Comedian and Actor Red Foxx.

Walter Dyett retired in 1961, and without him the Hi-Jinks shows ground to a halt within a few years.  He passed away in 1969. A special Hi-Jinks show was resurrected in 1985 in conjunction with DuSable’s 50th anniversary, with a special dedication to Captain Walter Dyett. 

Dyett is certainly remembered in Chicago.  There is even a school named after him.