Recorded in 1963 by an eleven piece band, "Black Saint" is Mingus' crowning achievement, It's also more than any other of his works, the most gracious example of Ellington flattery.
If ever there was ever a doubt about the influence of Duke Ellington upon Charles Mingus, Black Saint and the Sinner Lady should put any arguments to rest.
The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady is a microcosm of the entire Mingus discography, almost like a jazz history lesson of sorts. One of the things about Mingus and his best music has a feeling of recklessness, as if the music is a runaway train that could derail at any second, yet somehow manages to always make it back to the station.
The train might be beat up a bit, but somehow it arrived in one piece. I will spare you any track by track analysis, or bore you with any music theory, which by the way I would have to lift from another source anyway, a former bar band guitarist does not a music theorist make.
As a 20 year listener of jazz music, and a real connoisseur of big band and orchestra music, you will be hard pressed to finding a more moving large band jazz album.
Though I can, and have described the moods and feelings invoked, This music has an undiluted anger to it, an anguish, a feeling of desperation. Yet like Ellington, a softer romantic color at times.
If by chance you're a vinyl record collector as I am, you owe it to your self to hear this timeless classic in the vinyl format. A first press mono preferably. It might set you back 100 bucks, but worth every penny.
Black Saint belongs in every jazz collection, along with Mingus Ah Um and Blues n' Roots, Modern Jazz rarely delivers better on the emotional level like Black Saint and the Sinner Lady.
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