Editing Wardell Gray (section)

===Disappearance and death===
Gray was still working regularly despite his drug problems, and when [[Benny Carter]] was engaged in May 1955 to provide the band at the opening of the [[Moulin Rouge Hotel]], he called on Gray. Gray attended rehearsals but was absent when the club opened on May 25. The next day he was found on a stretch of desert on the outskirts of Las Vegas<ref name="JazzBook"/> dead with a broken neck. At the age of 34, he died of a heroin overdose.<ref name="Bebop" />

Although various sources still describe the circumstances of Gray's death as mysterious, the closing note of a solography on the tribute website wardellgray.org states that " 'The circumstances are now clear (ref. Han Schulte interviewing Teddy Edwards in the late 80s): Teddy was on the spot, May 1955 in Las Vegas, when WG died in his hotel room after an overdose. His friends, working with the group of Benny Carter in LA, wanted no police trouble, so they put his body in a car and brought it to the desert. By unloading, the body fell on the ground and his neck was broken. That's it.' "<ref>{{cite web |author1=Evensmo, Jan |author2=Accardi, James |title=The Tenorsax of Wardell Gray |url=https://wardellgray.org/pdfdocuments/Wardell%20Gray%20Solography.pdf |website=wardellgray.org |access-date=26 September 2023 |page=37 |format=.pdf |date=8 June 2014}}</ref>