Charles Mingus [Prestige]

About Charles Mingus [Prestige]

Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus is an album by jazz bassist and composer Charles Mingus, recorded in 1960 and released in December the same year. The quartet of Mingus, Eric Dolphy, Ted Curson and Dannie Richmond constituted Mingus's core working band at the time, and had been performing the material on this album for weeks at The Showplace in New York. To recreate this atmosphere, Mingus introduces the songs as if he were speaking to the audience, even admonishing them to not applaud or rattle their glasses. The album was recorded in October 1960 in New York for Nat Hentoff's label Candid. Mingus usually recorded on major labels like Columbia and Atlantic, but was given more freedom on Hentoff's independent label. "Folk Forms, No. 1" is built on a rhythmic pattern. According to Mingus, "they had to listen to what I do on the bass. If I changed it, they'd have to go a different way. This is a very flexible work. About the only other guidance I give them is that if I hear them doing something particularly good one night, I remind them of it next time we play the number and suggest they keep it in. But as a whole, it never comes out the same". This song features melodic drum work from Dannie Richmond and sympathetic interplay by Ted Curson and Eric Dolphy. The quartet also performed the tune in Antibes with the addition of Booker Ervin on tenor saxophone; the concert is released on Mingus at Antibes.  more »