Charles
Mingus (bass); Jon Faddis (trumpet); Charles McPherson (alto sax, clarinet);
Bobby Jones (tenor sax, clarinet); John Foster (piano, vocal); Roy Brooks
(drums).
The third disc of this must
have set is as equally compelling as the other two and maybe even more thought provoking albeit not without a degree of hokum.
Fables of Faubus: Perhaps Mingus' most controversial composition, and there were many, has one of Faddis' most dynamic solos. The teenager (19) telling the world he was on his way - move over Miles, tell Dizzy the news. Not that Dizzy needed telling - he'd mentored him!
There's a lot going on apart
from Faddis. The changes of tempo, Foster's probing Monkish solo, the horns
and, as ever, the scored passages, the bass behind it all and occasionally
moving down front to brandish the bow arco fashion. Most will remember the
original from the album Mingus Ah Um but this 35 minute blast
takes it above and beyond. The racial implications of the title are too well
known to recount but they are given an ironic twist when Mingus plays a series of quotes from John Brown's Body, Over the Rainbow, I Wish I Was in Dixie and Camptown Races before the band chants Shortnin' Bread behind his solo. It all ends as if in the chaos of a Mississippi protest march being baton charged.
Pops (When the Saints go Marching in): A tribute to Louis Armstrong, who'd died the year previous, with vocal by Foster, Faddis holding long notes before heading off way up high, Jones blowing clarinet and Mingus playing slap bass - remember when we used to call him Charlie? These guys knew where the music came from, where it was and where it was going. In the Dixieland style finale Roy Brooks finishes it off so effectively with idiomatic drum breaks that I almost expected him to shout "Oo yah Oo yah" à la Lennie Hastings!
The Man Who Never Sleeps featured Faddis, introduced by Mingus as "our 11-year-old trumpet player" who duly brings it in virtuoso fashion followed by McPherson, then more Faddis - this cat really was on fire - Foster cools things down, but only slightly, how could he with the leader's bass keeping him on course. Jones plays some subtone clarinet before he picks up the pace and starts wailing. Time for the guvnor to suggest that sleep was in fact approaching although the final 45 seconds of Air Mail Special put any soporific notions aside!
Simply tremendous! Lance
The complete album is due for release by Resonance Records on April 29 but can be pre-ordered.
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