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Charles Mingus
Charles Mingus Jr. (April 22, 1922 – January 5, 1979) was an American jazz upright bassist, pianist, composer, bandleader, and author. A major proponent of collective improvisation, he is considered to be one of the greatest jazz musicians and composers in history, with a career spanning three decades and collaborations with other jazz musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Herbie Hancock. Mingus’s work ranged from advanced bebop and avant-garde jazz with small and midsize ensembles – pioneering the post-bop style on seminal recordings like Pithecanthropus Erectus (1956) and Mingus Ah Um (1959) – to progressive big band experiments such as The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady (1963)
The Mythical Life of Charles Mingus
Charles Mingus was no ordinary man. He was larger than life, not only as a great jazz bassist and band leader, but as classical composer Gunther Schuller claimed, was one of America’s greatest composers.
Born in Arizona, but raised in Los Angeles. Mingus was of Negro, Chinese and Indian heritage. In his own words, he never fit in, being too light to be accepted as a negro and too dark to be white.