Legendary musicians
Sunday, 2007 August 12th, 8 PM
Dzintari Concert Hall
Jazz music concert
MINGUS BIG BAND (USA)
The Mingus Dynasty Band was formed in 1979 to carry on the legacy of composer/bassist/bandleader Charles Mingus and to perform his great repertory of American composition -- the largest, after Duke Ellington, in American music, which he left behind. Its first appearance at Carnegie Hall in New York City in the spring of 1979, as part of a two-day Mingus tribute a few months after Mingus’ death.
Members of the Mingus Dynasty, subsequently became part of the 31-piece orchestra which premiered Mingus’ two-hour masterpiece, “Epitaph,” at Lincoln Center in 1989. It was absorbed into the Mingus Big Band which has ranged from a septet to a quintet and has until recently been performing in New York at the Fez, Under the Time Cafe, every Thursday since the Fall of 1991. After the closing of Fez, we moved to Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater on March 24. The Mingus Big Band is playing every Tuesday at Iridium Jazz club.
Most recently, a Mingus Dynasty Quintet, made up of younger members of the Big Band (as well as an occasional musician who played with Mingus himself,) began to tour. Their first performance took place at the Boston Conservatory of Arts, in connection with the screening of the recent documentary, “Charles Mingus: Triumph of the Underdog.” Some of its members (John Hicks on piano; Seamus Blake on tenor; Boris Koslov on bass) contributed to the recent “Charles Mingus: More than a Play-Along,” an educational tool for music students and players which is being distributed by Hall Leonard Publishing.
The hippest big band in the universe – robust, earthy, and sanctified
Time Out New York
An astonishingly telepathic ensemble
New York Daily News
