Dave Brubeck (1920 - 2012 AD), the American jazz pianist and composer, best known for the jazz classic "Take Five," was a convert to Catholicism. Although the horrors he witnessed during his service with Patton's Third Army in World War II jolted Brubeck into a spiritual awakening, he didn't actually convert until 1980. However, Brubeck didn't think "conversion" described his case very well, since, as he said "I didn't convert to Catholicism, because I wasn't anything to convert from. I just joined the Catholic Church." In 2006, the University of Notre Dame awarded Brubeck its Laetare Medal, its oldest and most prestigious honor.
Brubeck composed a jazz Mass, which is not my cup of tea, but you can listen to some of it here:
