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A Quasi-Centennial Mingus Festivus: The Charles Mingus Songbook, Part 1
by Ludovico Granvassu
Charles Mingus would have turned 99 years old on 22 April 2021. So with a year ahead of his centennial celebration we've decided to focus this edition of Mondo Jazz on Mingus as a composer, featuring some of the best renditions of his most memorable compositions.Happy listening!PlaylistBen Allison Mondo Jazz Theme (feat. Ted Nash & Pyeng Threadgill)" 0:00 Maceo Parker “Better Get Hit in Yo' Soul" Roots Revisited (Minor) 0:16 Host talks 5:56 Osmiza “Fables of ...
read moreMark Sullivan's Best Releases of 2020
by Mark Sullivan
Despite the circumstances, this was a high volume year for album releases, rich in both quantity and quality. Mine is not a ranked listing, but more or less in reverse chronological order. Since I wrote fewer album reviews than average, for the first time I have included several releases that I did not review myself. Nels Cline Share The Wealth Blue Note Records The expanded Nels Cline Singers: now a sextet with the ...
read moreCharles Mingus: @ Bremen 1964 & 1975
by Mike Jurkovic
It is 1964 and the big bass emperor rules the old continent as he commanded every stage he set foot on. So @ Bremen 1964 & 1975 just does not sound right. Charles Mingus Swings Bad Ass and Liberates Your Body and Your Mind @ Bremen sounds way more like it. For—as much as anything in his grand, sweeping arc serves to highlight how mercurial and spot-on his real time genius was—this previously unreleased four-disc joy bomb will certainly be ...
read moreCharles Mingus: @ Bremen 1964 & 1975
by Chris May
Four hours of previously unissued, premier-league music by Charles Mingus is something to shout about, and @ Bremen 1964 & 1975 is about as good as the bassist and composer's posthumously released live albums get. Four CDs chronicle two extended, intense performances recorded in Germany by Radio Bremen. Both gigs featured all-star bands and both are typically and gloriously uplifting Mingus melanges of through-composition and in-the-moment improvisation touching on blues and roots, bop, hard bop, New Orleans marching band, swing, ...
read moreDavid Billingsley, Charles Mingus, Bobby Watson and more
by Joe Dimino
This week we profile a lot of jazz musicians that we interviewed during the pandemic. We begin with Minneapolis pianist David Billingsley with a song off his new debut CD Hymns from Grandma's Living Room. We also feature Henry Robinett, Gary Smulyan and DreamRoot. Finally, we profile a new track off Bobby Watson's latest album Keepin' It Real. Enjoy. Playlist David Billingsley “Amazing Grace" Hymns from Grandma's Living Room (Intersound) 00:00 Host talks 5:00 Hank Jones and Frank ...
read moreCharles Mingus in the 1960s (1959 - 1963)
by Russell Perry
Charles Mingus completed the 1950s with an astonishing series of releases in 1959 -Blues and Roots, followed by Mingus Ah Um and finally, Mingus Dynasty. He kept up this pace for several years culminating in 1963 with Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus and his masterwork, The Black Saint and The Sinner Lady. We have some live recordings from 1964 and 1965, but otherwise he went silent for the rest of the decade. The early 1960s recordings of Charles Mingus with ...
read moreThe Experimentalists – Charles Mingus, Sonny Rollins, and John Coltrane (1956 - 1959)
by Russell Perry
In his book “Hard Bop: Jazz and Black Music 1955-1965," David Rosenthal outlines a group of musicians within the hard bop idiom that he identifies as “experimentalists," describing them as ..."consciously trying to expand jazz's structural and technical boundaries: for instance, pianist Andrew Hill, Sonny Rollins, and John Coltrane prior to his 1965 record Ascension. This category would also include Thelonious Monk and Charles Mingus, whose playing and compositions were at once experimental and reminiscent of the moods and forms ...
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