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SwingJournal #15
Mingus Ah Um
Artist : Charles Mingus
Original Recorded Date : May 5th and 12th, 1959
Original Label : Columbia Records
Recorded Location : Columbia 30th Street, New York
Producer : Teo Maceo
Engineer : Ray Moore
Better Git It in Your Soul
Audio File
Download Sheet Music for Charles Mingus' "Better Git It in Your Soul"
Solo Guitar Arrangement/Performance by Hideaki Tokunaga
Goodbye Pork Pie Hat :
Bassist and leader Charles Mingus wrote this composition to dedicate to a tenor saxophonist Lester Young who passed away right before this recording. On this track, you can listen to tenor saxophonists, Shafi Hadi and Booker Ervin. They played unison on the first chorus and 2nd chorus still play unison but John Hardy joins also as a tenor saxophonist. When Hardy joins, he changes register to octave lower. After the melody, Handy continues as a soloist and he is the only soloist on this composition. The second chorus of his solo, he and Mingus play tremolo together for 4 bars. The ensemble play head out melodies for two choruses.
Boogie Stop Shuffle : This was a simple Bb minor blues. However it starts out lower register unisons by one tenor sax, trombone, bass and piano. Mingus and Horace Parlan keeps same motives on 2nd and 3rd chorus when tenor sax and trombone disappears and the other horn players add hits as backgrounds. Horace Parlan's right hand is partially not functioned due to his early age polio. Therefore he is using combination of his two right hand fingers and mostly left hand fingers. You can listen to his techniques as a melody player, soloist and accompanist on this track. On 4th and 5th chorus, all horn players has bebop-ish unison melodies. After they finish playing melodies, Booker Ervin plays the first soulful solo. Parlan is a second soloist and you can listen to his influence from Bud Powell and Horace Silver. Handy plays alto saxophone solo for two chorus and the ensemble stats playing the opening figures for a drummer, Danny Richmond's solo. After Richmond's open solo, the ensemble play head out melodies.
Self-Portrait in Three Colors : Little T was composed by the trumpeter, Donald Byrd. Morgan and C Sharpe's unison triplet notes hit on two beat, then the rhythm section has hits as response to the melody. This medium up tempo composition is comprised of four eight-bar phrases in an AABA form. Lee Morgan plays three chorus of solo with great ideas, then C Sharpe follows as the second soloist and he plays four choruses with nice tone and ideas. Silver is the third soloist, and he only plays two choruses. But Silver only choose melody like phrases, therefore he plays the solo as if it is written melodies. After Silver's solos, Morgan starts playing solo again and this time with his mute on trumpet, and this time he plays 2 choruses. After Morgan's mute solos, the bassist Wilbur Ware keeps playing the steady quarter beats with two notes. It turns out to be a bass solo and Philly Joe takes his 8 bars solo on B section. Ware and Philly Joe get little wild toward the end, but Morgan and C Shape suddenly plays the same unison triplet notes, then ending melody starts.
Gaza Strip
Very short open F7 intro by Parlan and Mingus guide ensemble to play a simple unison line by two tenor saxophone players Hadi and Ervin. The ensemble plays the melody three times without solo. On second chorus Ervin changes plays the same melody but octave lower along with trombonist Willie Dennis' counter melody. On third chorus, it is hard to describe who plays the theme melody. Sometimes nobody is playing the melody but we listeners can hear imaginary melody line clearly because this is the third time listening to the melody.
Open Letter to Duke
Tenor saxophonist, Ervin starts solo before the theme melody with uplifting tempo. After he plays a couple choruses, drummer Richmond fills in solo, then very short melody is played by whole ensemble just for one chorus. Then tempo changes, then Hadi plays the main melody with his alto saxophone. Many counter melodies can he heard with different instruments like the way Duke Ellington orchestrated his compositions. Toward end of this mellow section, trombone single line stands up against saxophone sections' main theme. Then they rush together to faster tempo but this time with Latin flavor. Calypso style free improvisations in the key of Bb concludes this composition.
Bird Calls
The form of this composition is in a 18 bar cycle. Or we can consider that a chorus is 16 bar plus 2 extended bars. Therefore the ensemble mostly play 18 bars for one chorus during solos and monodies but sometimes they play 16 bars without extended bars. It could be a mistake but it becomes spontaneous arrangement. On this up-tempo tune, melodies consists with bebop-ish eigth note lines, but it is more avant-garde side. I feel like that this is the best interpretation of Bebop in Mingus' language. Three saxophonists Hardy (alto), Hadi (alto) and Ervin (tenor) play the melodies. The first solo is Ervin with nice clean tone. Parlan plays the second solo. His left hand techniques on this type of uptempo composition are amazing. As I mentioned early about Parlan's right hand and you can hear a lot of sophisticated cluster chords here. It sounded like Monk and Evans together. Next Handy plays solo with many bird's phrases. Richmond is the last soloist and the solo is open. The ensemble plays melodies three times and saxophones reminds to play the animal birds' figures after the melody.
Fables of Faubus
Tenor saxophonists Erving and Hadi start suspicious spooky unison melody intro with a trombonist Jimmy Knepper. Mingus plays solid bass notes behind them. When Hardy plays the main melody Knepper joins as harmony parts but Erving and Hadi still play the spooky motives. On Mingus' live recording called "Mingus presents Mingus", he introduces "Fables of Faubus" as his dedication to American Heros. This composition happens to be an ironic dedication to Arkansas Governor who sent armed National Guards to prevent nine African American students to enter all-white Little Rock Central High School. President Eisenhower sent US Army to protect these African American students as a counter.
The composition is written in AABA form. The B section is 16. The half of the section B, the rhythm section plays double tempo. The first solo is by an alto saxophonist Handy for half of chorus and then Parlan plays the second solo. Erving as a tenor saxophonist plays the third solo. Mingus plays the last solo. The whole ensemble returns from the section B to close out the composition.
Pussy Cat Dues
Like "Fables of Faubus", tenor saxophone and trombone starts spooky intro, and they keep on playing same motives when the main melody enters. But this time, the main melody is played by Hardy as a clarinetist but soon a trombonist Knepper takes over the melody. The ensemble becomes like Dixieland jazz. It is a 12 bars blues composition in the key of D. However even though it starts with D chord, there is a tricky modulation within a chorus and the chorus ends with Eb chords. But overtime it restarts with D. Solo choruses are in the form of simple 12 bar Eb blues. Knepper is the first soloist, subtle and quiet and shout chorus are played by Handy and Erving. Parlan is the second soloist and it is so bluesy. Hardy plays clarinet solo with a strong influence of Johnny Hodges. Mingus is no.4 soloist. The solo is taken care by Ernin as a tenor saxophonist. The melody shifts to D and ends with Eb.
Jelly Roll
This composition is written in 14 bars cycle and it is in the key of Ab. However it starts with its 5th chords Eb7. The rhythm section keeps in two rhythm along with Mingus slapping his strings. It reminds me of Milt Hinton's bass techniques. Knepper starts with his trombone open solo for just one 1 chorus to set up for melody players. Handy's alto saxophone has the main melody and Hadi and Ervin's tenor saxophones play harmonized unison lines. Knepper keeps playing his open solo from the intro, but occasionally he responds to the main melodies for a call and respond effect. Hadi plays solo while the rhythm section keeps in two feel. The second chorus, the ensemble shifts to swing. Parlan plays the 2nd solo with swing feel by borrowing phrases from Sonny Rollins' "Sonnymoon for Two". Ervin plays solo with very laid back time feel. Mingus plays the last solo to be clear that this composition is dedicated to his hero, Jelly Roll Morton. They play two choruses for heading out but they also have long call and respond ending between rhythm section and horn players. Sometime I can also hear Mingus shouting.
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