Charles Mingus' Let My Children Hear Music: Free Wheeling Powerful 70's Big Band Jazz

Here is a tasty big band recording from Charles Mingus:

Let My Children Hear Music is an obscure recording in a sense, you don't hear it mentioned in many of the Mingus best of lists. Truth is, that list is so long, 5 or 10 records usually only scrape the surface anyway.

Most people are familiar with, what many believe to be Mingus's Magnum Opus The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady.

 A study in Ellingtonia, Mingus's biggest influence compositionally, and one of best jazz releases of the 60's for sure.

 Let my Children Hear Music is from 1971,  the Ellington sound is not nearly as pronounced to my ears, I happen to think the track "Hobo Ho" is one of the best pieces Mingus ever did, and easily in my top 10 of Mingus compositions. His Bass playing is spectacular on the entire recording, and really drives the music to powerful heights.

Why this recording isn't as well known as other Mingus masterpieces is a mystery to me, orchestrated chaos might be a good way to described the music, at times the power of the band threatens to come apart at the seams, as with many of Mingus's best works.

Charles Mingus' The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady: Emotional Large Band Masterpiece

 Charles Mingus and his masterpiece The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady should easily be considered one of the 10 greatest recordings in Modern Jazz history.

 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.

Charles Mingus Tijuana Moods LP 1957-1962

Tijuana Moods is a strange album to me, I don't think it sounds like the typical Mingus album. At least not the way I think of Mingus.

I think about Blue & Roots, and Mingus Ah Um, and The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady.

Tijuana Moods is still an exceptional piece of music.  Judging by the amount of edits needed to piece it together, this album had to have been a labor of love for Mingus.

Mingus does mention on the back cover no less, that Tijuana Moods was the best album he ever made.

One wonders exactly when Charles was meaning this best album claim, as this music was made in 1957, and not released until 1962, did he mean this for 1957 or 1962?

 I like Tijuana Moods, its an interesting, if some what flawed listen.  I certainly don't consider it as great as Mingus Ah Um or The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, the latter in my estimation the greatest of all Mingus works. But I hold so much of his legacy so high that you begin to grasp at straws trying to pick a best Mingus record anyway.

Tijuana Moods seems like a work in progress, which honestly is something I don't mind, as Mingus' best work always seem raw and unrefined.

Saxophonist Shafi Hadi (Curtis Porter) shines very brightly on the album, he plays with a pissed off fire that you might expect coming from a Mingus side man.

Hadi completely dropped out of site in the early 60's, he can be heard on another Mingus album The Clown.

This early 60's copy, I presume it is a first pressing was a great find? I purchased a huge lot of Mingus albums several years ago, the covers were all on the worn to rough side. I gambled on it, the dealer had a generic VG grade on the lot, turned out most of the vinyl was VG+ to near mint in all honesty, I was pleasantly surprised to say the least.

You can get a copy like this pictured copy in the 50 dollar price range if you shop around, this has also been reissued on high quality vinyl with bonus tracks added.

Charles Mingus, Blues & Roots (1960): Free Wheeling Blues Whaling

I have always considered Charles Mingus the poor man's Duke Ellington, not meant as a slight at all.

Where duke's music was sophisticated and refined, though still exotic at times, Mingus was earthy and visceral. I prefer the Mingus music over Ellington's in fact.

 Charles' best music sounds like a runway freight train that somehow makes it back to the station in one piece. Without question my favorite Mingus album is Blues & Roots.

 Mingus' response to the critics who had been chirping that he didn't swing enough, he ran a blues flag up the poll, and hear how proudly that flag displays it's gritty down home colors.

"Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting" sounds just like what Sunday morning might sound like in the African American church, the mid point hand clapping and the Booker Ervin Solo are what Jazz dreams are made of.

Can you you think of a ballsier tenor/alto combo than Booker Ervin and Jackie McLean?  these guys love that aforementioned freight train, as their own playing adds to the overall gritty "on the edge" vibe.

Then you throw in the hard tone of baritone saxophonist Pepper Adams.  He starts "Moanin" off in style.

I have always preferred Adams' tone on baritone more than Gerry Mulligan's lighter more sterilized sound. Pepper has this guttural sound that really melds well with the brass.

Blues & Roots may not be the most important record in Mingus' discography, but it is the the most straight ahead no-bullshit album of his career.

 If your just coming into jazz, Check out The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, Mingus ah um, and Let My Children Hear Music, the latter being the most underrated in the Mingus catalog.