Charles Mingus Speaking

[raveniskcrow]

This is not ebonic's! The problem is that the recording has a lot of static. He was playing with his interviewer. You have to look at this through the prism of the time. I think he was trying to indicate that there was just as much racism in America as was in Nazi Germany. Listen carefully to the tone of the interviewer. Also, remember that Mingus had a great explosive temper. He had a lot of NY street sense!

[MakeMoney713]

I can understand him... he is speaking with a southern accent and it's mumbled by the tobacco pipe

[13neirad]

the interviewer is so snappy..

[LeSexisme]

3:12 - Black Saint and the Sinner Lady

[limeygringo]

I don't think his dialect or accent is why I can't hear what he's saying, I think it's because the audio quality sucks. It's an old recording

[casshan2085]

@eggbertsmith.my brother I merely made a statement responding to the fact that most people here are asking for a transcript because that cant understand what Mingus is saying..I dont believe anyone form Cali would say Mingus speaks with a "Californian" dialect.His dialect is a direct carry over from slavery when slaves spoke in a manner their masters could understand. Not unlike caribbean patois or Liberian English...Whats not odd is that most people here cant understand what he's saying...thus

[jodi183]

@casshan2085 I understand what he's saying. He just talks a little fast once in a while. Probably due to the amphetamines he used to take. He's from Arizona and grew up in Los Angeles. Also, I think his mom was Chinese. Don't think the southern dialect thing holds true. Sorry. The sound quality sucks and there's pops and drops in the sound. That is true but, more than anything, he reminds me of speed freaks when he talks. That also explains the gun. A little paranoid at that time in his life.

[stratovarius36]

i wish we had subtitles

[casshan2085]

I stand corrected...I mainly was trying to respond to the fact that some couldn't understand what he was saying..thus I hadn't researched beyond the fact that he mentioned Hoover.thanks I'm now better informed.

[jodi183]

@casshan2085 Glad to hear you admit fault. Hard telling not knowing so better left unsaid. Had you visited the deep south and spent some time around African-Americans you may not have made that comment. It's okay though, we all learn from our mistakes. But ya, Mingus, he was a tried and true Cali boy. Enjoy his music, he was one of the best!

[casshan2085]

For those of you that can't understand what he's saying,he's speaking with a strong "black" southern dialect.it's what has affectionately come to be known as "Ebonics,which is simply a short hand dialect that only those within the enthnic group are supposed to understand .But basically what I gather he is talking about are the" Hoover Days" a very rough economic time in American history.he said he'd written president Hoover several times to let him know he was being a good"little black boy".lik

[zaxmania]

@casshan2085 He's talking about J Edgar Hoover of the FBI not the president Hoover.

[eggbertsmith]

@casshan2085 Odd that a man who great up in Southern California is said to have a: strong "black" southern dialect.

[TonyCook2012]

The Brando of Jazz

[dacancelmofam]

what is this from, can i get a whole film?

[sbgskf]

@dacancelmofam

Filmmaker Thomas Reichmann, "Mingus" shot 1967 if I remember correctly. I have only a VHS, don't know if it ever made it to DVD...

[unclejunglebass]

"when eric and i went to germany...." i sense a mingus & dolphy bromance

[aaronamccoy]

crazy mad genius

[Nef1122]

The little girl is his daughter.

[14heroes]

The fact that my English is not good enough to understand what this great man is trying to say is just sad.... I can't understand what he is saying and even the written part... I cant make a sense out of it... AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH !! WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO SAY Mr. MINGUS!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

[Jazzyteach65]

This is sad and f*cked up. Such a brilli8ant man

[wgwigh]

oh my god... hugely built pipe-smoking double bass player... i may be a reincarnation of charles mingus.

[calico992]

Not that it matters, but don't people don't know that Mingus has alot of Chinese and Mexican in his blood! Kind of cool! People always think 'black' cats have the best rhythm, and Mingus was VOTED the #1 best jazz bassist ever (I'll take Paul Chambers Thanks) but this cats got a bit of all races! Rad! Race doesn't matter! Dig!

[bongolicious]

@calico992

Thats true... you can SEE it if you look closely at his features. Great bassist and composer and Jazzer. His book taught me how to fuck properly, too...

[AChozenSunn]

@bongolicious whats the name of the book?

[bongolicious]

@AChozenSunn

Beneath the underdog

[Merkaba4203]

Fucking J. Edgar Hoover.......... ugh..........

[XcaptainXobliviousX]

did anyone else arbitrarily assign him a much deeper voice before having seen this? xD

[GeorgeRBM1999]

Absolutely! Plays bass, rough character, big guy...all says baritone voice to me. Funny the assumptions we make!

[opalmermaid]

i love this man!!

[GeorgeRBM1999]

I heard Mingus was a tough guy to play with. Occassionally beat up his side men who weren't up to snuff. Anyone else heard those stories?

[brewereric]

Most doubt that was true, although he did have a short fuse he was not a violent man. He was not paitent nor the teaching type he never inflicted abuse towards a struggling musician

[GeorgeRBM1999]

That sounds more likely. Those legends tend to grow past the reality. Thanks for the info!

[d2theutchgold2]

No its true, he could be really violent towards his musicians, he broke jimmy kneppers jaw in an arguement. theres interviews on you tube sayin it if ya dont believe me.

[elixirguitarist]

I also heard that Mingus once dropped the piano lid on another fellow musician's fingers.

He seems so easy-going in the film though.

[brewereric]

@elixirguitarist yeah, i guess when your being evicted thers some sort of humble like attitude present. his kids seem to be the shy type form other footage. so many of these guys were missunderstood.

[tbonehauer05]

that was how he got kicked out of the ellington band. he was kicked out after punching out juan tizol and going after him with a fireaxe. only person duke ever had to fire.

[GeorgeRBM1999]

Terrific stories, thanks for sharing. Has anyone written a good biography of Mingus? Musical genius and tortured soul is a pretty familiar combination, but always interesting.

[longboarder1960]

quite possibly the greatest jazz composer of alltime!

[IgorSavtchenko]

Mingus was an amazing man. He got evicted from that New York apartment for shooting a gun through a wall. Not sure if he injured anyone.

[lifestraight]

Where did you read that? Also is there a Mingus biography someone could recommend?

[XcaptainXobliviousX]

there's a Mingus AUTObiography, in fact.

"Beneath the Underdog: His World as Composed by Mingus"

be forewarned. this was written by Mingus. obviously. keep that in mind xD

[jawshchevyvan]

What an awesome man, so sweet and such a bad ass.

[loltheworld]

Who's the little white girl walking around?

[zaxmania]

that's his daughter.

[madhoneydew]

i wonder if the same people that thumbed this comment down are also nazis (as mingus says). or, at least, could be fine nazis (given the right conditions). you beasts.

being born is only a potential (aristotle). who of you have reached half of yours? those that have logs in their eyes tend to cast the first stone.

the one's that are afraid and want more life (and above all, no harm) will never have EARS TO HEAR.

[HalSamuel]

Why did he suddenly heave the blinds of the window, and throw them across the room?

[zyruemusic]

Once Mr.Mingus picked up that rifle nobody in that room wanted to know nothin but the direction of that rifle!!! LOL!!! A NIGGER WITH A GUN!!! GOD FORBID!!!

[madhoneydew]

folks still saluting without concern to the ones they're saluting against

you understand where he's coming from at least? this is the question. you herd hoi polloi shivering .... he lived with a gun at his head all the time.

i wonder if you all would say the same about your european tortured mozart, or perhaps chopin. all. you herd. moo you heard? go back to idaho, or perhaps redding.

[zyruemusic]

I FEEL YOU FAM!!! I see 5 thumbs down on my comment because folks didnt realize I was being funny and truthful...them whiteboys got nervous when they saw minus go for the rifle and Iwould imagine they were thinking OH SHIT!!! A NIGGER with a gun!!! I know about seeing guns to my head and close friends of mine killed in gun battles...I was raised in Long Beach...21St and Cerritos...THE HOOD!!! HOLLA IF YOU HEAR ME!!!!! PEACE!!!

[NYCBG]

Ouch! A Hick with a keyboard!!!

[zyruemusic]

EAT A BOWL FULL OF DICKS!!!

[NYCBG]

Why?

[japa1990]

no one is perfect

[japa1990]

I never said it only came from an unstable mind. I was just statin that you cant say his art is ugly just because you see his person being "ugly".

[louiestrums]

Mingus is one of the very few bass players electric or upright who you can see so many events of his life on film.

[davevontexas]

"Why have I written him? I've always written him... I try to inform him.. inform all the white folks that I'm trying to be a good boy."

I laughed, I cried, I stood up and cheered. This guy makes Hunter Thompson look like Maria von Trapp.

High fuckin five.

[14heroes]

@davevontexas I dont think my English is good enough to get like a good grasp of what he is trying to say... can you explain this like I am a 7 year old?... PLEASE...?These words all make sense seperately but together I dont know what he is saying!!

[Jon00Wesley00Harding]

What are you people talking about? Mingus was a complete shitprick to his whole band and even got into knife fights in off hours. When he wasn't on his medication (which was often) he was a jackoff to everybody around him.

[haitianjack5]

you failed to mention that despite all that he was a musical genius

[bearblaster420]

Unparalleled... But I'm always surprised at what we overlook because of genius. He may have written Goodbye Porkpie Hat, but that doesn't make him a "beautiful human-" quite the contrary, ironically

[japa1990]

what is a "beautiful human". To me is someone that has flaws because they have a story to tell, and also every musician has something "crazy", you use inperfection for the art.

[samadjhi]

Did you know Mingus? Or are you repeating what you heard?

[Jon00Wesley00Harding]

Of course I didn't know Mingus. His quick temper and personal flaws are legendary though.

It's funny how intimately related people seem to think the character of an artist and his work are related. It's not like genius and obnoxiousness can't co exist.

[samadjhi]

Your statement "it's not like genius and obnoxiousness can't coexist" is much different than calling someone the things that you have previously,"shithead","jackoff to his whole band."Hell I thought you know him. You are harder on him then some of the folks who played with him. I haven't heard them critique him as violently as you have.

[francisapple]

what a lovely man

[19andoverlol]

He's not crazy just because he wants to mount a shotgun tied to a string tied to the door handle on his ceiling!

[gggrzesiek]

beautiful human

[Namaps]

Man, I can't understand half of what he's saying. =[

Fuzzy audio + my headphones suck.

[JCR1992]

Greatest bassist of all-time

[stubs13]

I believe you

[bobsouls]

coolll... do you know BOB LENOX who played with him... with his new clip "that's not me".... a great voice for a great poet....BOB LENOX, a nice soul !

[stephendedlus]

this is part of a short doc film - very dark and sad and true. just look up mingus on imdb on you can track it down.

[Jazzman303]

guy: Don't do it...

Mingus: Why?

[aklb0um]

best video on youtube.

[mario21128]

God is great...

Mingus is great

[jerms90]

Therefore Mingus is God

[papalgoose]

I [Ming], there for [Ah Um]." -René Descartés

F-U J Edgar Hoover, ye fascist tranny!

[tmcdona1]

ahahahaha

[jun7per]

Mingus is a prophet..

[FunnyDigestion]

My favorite jazz guy.

[mrpossibilities]

Another crazy excentric genious, just like Hunter S Thompson. I love them both.

[jun7per]

he wasnt crazy...Mingus was a reflective, thoughtful artist..like all creative people.

[mrpossibilities]

You know what I mean. I don't mean crazy. I mean.... crazy. You know.

[sullyb23511]

Mingus was not "crazy", as in psychotic, but he was diagnosed as bipolar. He should have been taking some kind of medication and seeing a psychiatrist. But that doesn't matter, really, because he was a genius.

[robertvideo]

Sir Charles Rules... Mingus is GOD

[nahikuroots]

amen. a friend told me bout this video 15 years ago. finally get to see it and no gun fired. dang.

[spiderbass65]

Where's the rest of the video???????

He actually fires the gun off - while the people taping it are begging him not to....

[yogione]

Clint Eastwood may be right. I extracted this from CM's obit: "Following a private Hindu ceremony, his ashes were scattered over the Ganges River by his wife. Mr. Mingus who was married several times, is survived also by five children and two stepchildren." It's a fact that the child seems to be a familiar and may well be.

[mojoelem]

Yes, i do recall reading about Charles's ashes being spread along the Ganges. I think John Coltrane also wanted that to be done to himself. ( i think i recall reading this)

[yogione]

Marlene Dietrich's daughter Maria Riva and her family lived on that street. I used to like to trick or treat there because it was fairly friendly. Two blocks north, a white child would be chased down the street for being bold or stupid enough to venture there. The problem here is that this artist who we all knew who played with other household names was not in a position to buy in the upper east side. I was twenty when this one came out. '68 was one of those long hot summers.

[yogione]

This was filmed in almost the same breath as Stokely Carmichael's invective against Leonard Bernstein announcing that black people didn't need white people to help liberate them, Jews and blacks had tended to see each other as peas in a pod until then. That later changed. Mingus knew about Nazis and other racists. He was no racist himself. My guess is the attraction to the neighborhood kids was the music that came from that house.

[mojoelem]

Yes, Stokely was really OTT back then. He and Dick Gregory really stirred up some heated sentiments of extremism. It was a helluva era. Very volatile.

[yogione]

Dick Gregory was a very funny comic prior, (forgive the pun) to becoming a radical. Even after he was into the raw food thing with his friend Viktoras Kulvinskas he made some pretty good cracks. Most notably I recall his saying that it wasn't until he had spawned nine children that he realized that he and his spouse were doing something beside getting it on.

[yogione]

When I see a rifle with a string attached, I figure it's either a suicide plan or possibly as in this case a means of setting up a booby trap for a burglar. If E. 95th street was borderline it was street where the kids played on the sidewalk. Chevy Chase lived on that block. He and Tom Reichman were classmates. Small world.

[dreadtodred]

mingus, monk and a lot of those cats went through hell just to play and tour around this country,daling with ignorance and complete misunderstanding.paranoia is not a staple of his feelings

[mojoelem]

Oh most definitely. And those musicians were gentlemen back then,well dressed, always gracious and courteous not like the jumped up, untalented, overrated people who pass for artists today. Back in England during the 60s we had a Jamaican guy called Joe Harriot (unbelievable alto saxplayer) who went thru hell also.

[yogione]

Sue Mingus married Charles in '75 and Tom Reichman died also in '75 on January 26th. I Googled his bio. I wouldn't know if brother Steve was his crew for this. I think Clint Eastwood is mistaken that it is Mingus' daughter if Sue met him in the "mid sixties." This film was made in '68.

[yogione]

I take that back. See previous comment.

[yogione]

Tommie Reichman was a childhood friend of mine. Henry and Stella Reichman outlived both their kids, as did Charles Mingus outlive Tom. I always found it strange when my father told me that Henry Reichman was actually relieved that he didn't have to deal with his sons: the one who o.d.'d on opiates and the other who made films with no commercial potential. I didn't hear how Tommie did himself in - just that he did himself in. Too bad.

[mojoelem]

yogione; Your entry about Henry Reichman not being too upset reminds me of Al Hendrix's reaction on hearing about Jimi's death. His first words were "How much money did he leave behind and who gets it?" Unbelievable ehh?

[mojoelem]

Like Thelonius Monk , Charles was a paranoid schizophrenic. It's such a common condition among creative people..drug abuse brings it on too. Just look what happened to the writer Philip Dick.

[GolumTR]

Mingus was Bipolar, not Schizophrenic.

[mojoelem]

Sorry, yes , you are correct. Mind you Mingus, like T Monk and Albert Ayler, was so deep no one truly knows his accurate mental state. It was a common sign of genius though.

[PinkCloud37]

Mingus is great, but I cannot understand a damn thing he is saying. His pipe really doesn't help either.

[GolumTR]

That's the pipe from the cover of Black Saint and the Sinner Lady. And I become a fan boy.

[mojoelem]

Yes, absolutely right. His persecution complex that comes to the surface here really points to some acute form of paranoid schizophrenia..although it is documented that bipolar was his problem.

[Chessboy]

what year was this?

[zaxmania]

1968

[mrpossibilities]

I remember this documentary. My favorite scene is the one where he picks up the gun and says "Well I'm shootin'....." and then *BANG* and you see the camera shaking, the cameraman obviously freaked out... and then he says "..... the gun". And you see this huge hole in the wall. Oh man did I laugh out loud.

[mojoelem]

This camera crew were shitting themselves when Mingus told him to "follow him to the next room". I felt sorry for Charles in this film but i totally understood his predicament. Creative artists have to dig so deep for material that it brings all sorts of demons to the surface.

[yogione]

There was no camera "crew." This film was shot by Tom Reichman who was a neighbor of Charles Mingus in the east nineties. Tom Reichman's father Henry Reichman went from rags to riches in the very early sixties and bought him a professional camera with sound. I don't think the crew was "shitting himself" making this movie. It's a fact that Tom Reichman committed suicide not long after he made this movie. I wouldn't confuse that for soiling one's pants.

[mojoelem]

Thanks for the info.I never knew it was Tom by himself.Also I had no idea that Reichman committed suicide. Terrible shame about that. Fantastic candid film whatever the background but i'm glad you've informed me.

[yogione]

It may well have been Steve Reichman who was the other pair of hands. This was no professional effort. Who is that little girl, I wonder? You may sense that Charles Mingus had already told Tom these stories but not on camera. The camera moves so there had to be someone else behind it when Tom comes in view. The block in question was east ninety fifth street the very edge of the silk stocking district.

[mojoelem]

They showed this film in the UK back around 1990. They were interviewing Clint Eastwood at the time about his film "Bird". Anyhow, Clint said that he thought the little girl was Charles's daughter.

[yogione]

Steve Reichman Tom's brother also did himself in. He died from an overdose of heroin in Tangiers. Tom got the camera when their father struck it rich, and Steve got a motorcycle and toured north Africa. I'm not sure who is at the tripod. It's not hand held work. Tom is minding the sound equipment. I used to trick or treat on that block when I was a kid. It was the last block in the silk stocking district . What you're seeing is gentrification.

[mojoelem]

Wow, what a shame. So many went the same way. This film has an extraordinary feel to it. I can't help but feel abit apprehensive when Mingus ushers him into the next room carrying a weapon. I'm sure Steve must've felt some trepidation especially with Mingus being such an unpredictable guy. I know i would've. There was a British guy called Nick Broomfield who did candid interviews like this. His subjects weren't as interesting as Charles.

[mojoelem]

Some parts of N.Y. are so seedy (alot like London where i grew up) but there's so much character, atmosphere and talent in those areas. Some of the most creative people choose the most seedy areas to work from. there's alot of stark beauty in this film...being in b&w adds to the atmosphere.

[dreadtodred]

thats true.brain storming constantly,over and over is extreme pressure

[bassist101maty]

wicked, why was he getting evicted? i dnt no a lot about Charels im only jus learning, but from what ive heard he has amazing musical talent.

[Jeaneathean]

The Man! Thanks for great clip!

[jnsyo]

it didn't show the part where he shoots the wall

[VintageFuzz]

Thank you for this amazing clip of the master. Do you have more of it? What is it from anyway?

Keep 'em comin!

[bazzartii]

This clip is taken from a longer documentary and the remarkably cool Charles is speaking to an interviewer whilst the baillifs are throwing is furniture out into the street. The guy xas in the middle of getting evicted.

[dagzine]

This is available from Rhapsody Films. The title: Mingus.

Some performance; mostly Mingus being interviewed while highly agitated and in the process of being evicted. Powerful and sad.