Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus

Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus is an album by jazz bassist and composer Charles Mingus, recorded and released in 1960. To produce an atmosphere, Mingus makes spoken introductions "live" in the studio: hence the album's title.

The album features a pianoless quartet, a small band for Mingus, in somewhat poor recording conditions on the small label Candid run by Nat Hentoff. Mingus usually recorded on major labels like Columbia and Atlantic; a reason for the choice of a small label was to record his composition "Fables Of Faubus" (here named "Original Faubus Fables") in its entirety: the version that appears on Mingus Ah Um is without its controversial lyrics (sung by Mingus and drummer Dannie Richmond) as Columbia felt it would cause problems in referring to Governor Orval Faubus as a "Nazi fascist".

Track listing

1. "Folk Forms No. 1" – 13:08
2. "Original Faubus Fables" – 9:19
3. "What Love?" – 15:23
4. "All The Things You Could Be By Now if Sigmund Freud's Wife Was Your Mother" – 8:33

All compositions by Charles Mingus

Personnel

• Charles Mingus – bass
• Ted Curson – trumpet
• Eric Dolphy – alto saxophone and bass clarinet
• Dannie Richmond – drums

References