Following a series of studio sessions with leading bebop figures including Tadd Dameron, Bud Powell, and Kenny Clarke, he became ill with tuberculosis and died at the age of 26.

Despite the short duration of his career, he had a strong stylistic influence on trumpet players who rose to fame in later decades, including Clifford Brown and Lee Morgan.

[5] By the time Navarro graduated from Frederick Douglass School in 1941, he wanted to be away from Key West and moved north to Orlando to join Sol Allbright's band.

[1] Vocalist Billy Eckstine invited the young trumpet player to join his band, which included several prominent musicians in the emerging bebop genre.

[6] Navarro participated in small group recording sessions with Kenny Clarke, Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, Coleman Hawkins, Illinois Jacquet, and Howard McGhee.

A recording with this group for Blue Note included Ernie Henry on alto saxophone and Charlie Rouse on tenor, both of whom contributed significantly to bebop in the 1940s and 1950s.

[11] Dameron went to great lengths to accommodate Navarro's position in the band, but the trumpeter's continued demands for higher pay ultimately led him to form his own group for studio sessions.

[2] In addition to regular studio recording, in the late 1940s Navarro began to compose, and many of his tunes were dedicated to Dameron's band, in which he continued to play on occasion.

Although Dizzy Gillespie described Navarro's personality as "sweet," at jam sessions he feuded often with Bud Powell and on one occasion attacked the pianist with his trumpet, but missed.

[15] During the ceremony, Linden High School Choir performed "Amazing Grace", while trumpeter Jon Faddis played Navarro's "Nostalgia".

The night of the same day, 14 trumpeters joined a stellar rhythm section to honor the Navarro songbook at the Jazz Standard in Manhattan.

Faddis, who assembled the section under musical direction from Don Sickler, was accompanied by drummer Billy Drummond, bassist Peter Washington, and pianist James Williams.