Charles Mingus: An Icon In The Jazz World

Charles Mingus, an icon in the Jazz world “only second to Duke Ellington (CHARLES MINGUS BIO). Mingus played a very important role in the development of jazz music, he left his mark on the world that got him a lot of recognition. Along with a plethora of grants that were donated to him and the different organizations that were centered on him. He was also honored in New York City by having a “Charles Mingus Day” dedicated to him and many other dedications and assortments of honoring’s (CHARLES MINGUS BIO). Charles Mingus was a phenomenal musician that has not only inspired those of his time, but a number of musicians even today.
Charles Mingus was born on April 22, 1922 on an army base in Nogales, Arizona and. However, Mingus grew up without
a mother in Los Angeles due to complications during the birth of Charles Mingus and he was raised by his step mother Mamie along with his two sisters. But ironically Los Angeles is seen today as one of the few cities that you can get famous in with just a little bit of talent and a devotion of time, it seems that Charles Mingus was destined to become this great artist. Charles Mingus definitely had the talent to become one of the most renowned musicians in the jazz industry. He started off picking up the trombone and reluctantly becoming very good at it. He had already found something that he was talented at, at a young age. After learning the trombone, he also proved himself to be an excellent cello player as well as a pianist. It was not until his teenage years that Mingus picked up the bass and became a superb bass player, the one that we all know him the most as today. After recognizing his talents, Charles Mingus soon became under tutorage by musicians of Red Callender and Herman Rheinschagen, which allowed him to grow as a musician for his career later (CHARLES MINGUS BIO. As Mingus progressed as a musician he began becoming very well-known and played with people such as “Louis Armstrong, Kid Ory, and Lionel Hampton” in the 1940’s (B.
Charles Mingus). He also later would play and record with other musicians such as “Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Bud Powell, Art Tatum, and Duke Ellington” (B. Charles Mingus). By the 1950’s Mingus had started his own recording and publishing companies in order to protect his compositions (B. Charles Mingus). One of the companies that he had formed was the Jazz Workshop, which was made in 1964. Mingus started the Jazz Workshop in the admits of the assassination of JFK and the civil rights movement (Charles Mingus, Charles Mingus Day). Not only was the company co-produced by a woman, but this woman would later become Charles Mingus’s wife. The Jazz Workshop allowed smaller and less known musicians to come and perform in concert and have it recorded. The Jazz Workshop produced “over 100 albums of his music and wrote over 300 scores” (B. Charles
Mingus).
Because of his success and the money that came with it, he was able to tour extensively throughout much of the Eastern Hemisphere, including much of Europe and Japan as well as touring in Canada, South America, and the United States. Mingus became a very successful musician and was awarded grants from The Smithsonian Institute and the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as two grants from the Guggenheim Foundation (B. Charles Mingus). Although the money is a great donation this was not the best thing he was given. Yale University gave Mingus an award called the “lifetime achievement award” and Brandeis University also gave Mingus an honorary degree. “The New Yorker wrote, ‘For sheer melodic and rhythmic and structural originality, his compositions may equal anything written in western music in the twentieth century" (5).
Many people believe that Charles Mingus was not just a fantastic composer and musician, but that he should be recognized as so much more such as a “major American composer.” Not just any composer, but a “major American composer,” which was a huge title not just at the time, but a title only the few well-known have. He often mentioned Duke Ellington as a major inspiration and used a lot of the same styles of Thelonious Monk. Mingus composed works most often of that of the New Orleans jazz, Mexican folk music, modern classical music (Jarenwattananon, P. (2012, October 21).
Charles Mingus by 1967 was suffering from a severe mental illness and severe depression.
By 1977, Charles Mingus was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s Disease (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis and was unfortunately confined to a wheelchair (B. Charles Mingus). However, he made a comeback and gradually recovered and although he could no longer play the piano or write music due to the disease, this did not stop Mingus and composed using only a tape recorder and his voice. However, at the age of 56 Mingus passed away in Cuernavaca, Mexico on January 5, 1979 due to a heart attack and was soon cremated (B. Charles Mingus). Interestingly enough, on the day of Mingus death 56 whales had been beached in Mexico and had to be burned as
well.
Because Charles Mingus was such an icon in the musical world, he left a legacy that would not be forgotten. “The National Endowment for the Arts provided more grants to the Mingus Foundation so they could catalogue all of Mingus' works” (B. Charles Mingus). During the process of cataloguing all of his works the “Epitaph” was uncovered and with the help of the Ford Foundation it “premiered by a 30-piece jazz orchestra conducted by Gunther Schuller and produced by Sue Mingus at Lincoln Centeris Alice Tully Hall in 1989” (B. Charles Mingus). As well as being given awards, grants, and praise; Charles Mingus was also given his own honorary stamp by the US Postal Service in 1995. Washington D.C. and New York City also devoted April 22 as “Charles Mingus Day” to him (Mingus, C. (1991). More than a fake book.).
Charles Mingus was a national inspiration, genius, and “warrior for civil rights.” His musical pieces’ reflect how much he cared about the civil rights and how devoted he was to show is opinion. It seems to me that Charles Mingus was one to put his opinion out there in order to inspire people and bring the real issues to the light in order to get them resolved. To me that is honorable and selfless, Mingus put his own safety and musical career on the line in order to talk about these issues. If there is one thing that I have learned from this research of Charles Mingus it is that he is not only a musician, but a cultural inspiration as well. His works and name will live on throughout the ages to continue to inspire those who are willing to listen with open ears.