Mingus Ah Um catapulted
Charles Mingus from a much-discussed semi-underground figure to a near-universally accepted and acclaimed leader in modern jazz. Perhaps that's why his
Columbia follow-up,
Mingus Dynasty, is often overlooked in his canon -- it's lost in the shadow of its legendary predecessor, both because of that album's achievement and the fact that it's just a notch below the uppermost echelon of
Mingus' work. Having said that,
Mingus Dynasty is still an excellent album; in fact, it's a testament to just how high a level
Mingus was working on that an album of this caliber could have gotten lost in the shuffle. There's a definite soundtrack quality to a great deal of the music here, and indeed the majority of
Mingus' originals here were composed for film and television scores and an expanded, nine- to ten-piece group. On some pieces,
Mingus refines and reworks territory he'd previously hit upon.
"Slop," for example, is another gospel-inflected 6/8 stormer, composed for a TV production that requested a piece similar to
"Better Get It in Your Soul." The ferocious
"Gunslinging Bird" follows a similar pattern, and it's the same piece whose full title,
"If Charlie Parker Were a Gunslinger, There'd Be a Whole Lot of Dead Copycats," is given elsewhere. There are a couple of numbers from the
Ellington songbook that both feature cellos --
"Things Ain't What They Used to Be" and a fantastic, eight-minute
"Mood Indigo" -- and a couple of pieces that rely on the even more tightly orchestrated approach of
Mingus' pre-
Pithecanthropus Erectus days --
"Far Wells, Mill Valley" and the atonal but surprisingly tender and melodic
"Diane." ~ Steve Huey
