Money Jungle

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Money Jungle
Studio album by Duke Ellington , Charles Mingus , Max Roach

Publication
(s)

1963

Label (s)

Format (s)

LP , CD

Genre (s)

jazz

Title (number)

LP :, CD:

running time

CD: 48:25

occupation
  • Bass : Charles Mingus

production

Alan Douglas

Studio (s)

Sound Makers , New York City

chronology
Studio Sessions, New York 1962
(1962) 		Money Jungle Duke Ellington & John Coltrane
(1963)

Money Jungle is a jazz album by pianist Duke Ellington with bassist Charles Mingus and drummer Max Roach , recorded on September 17, 1962; the album is named after the title song of the same name, a composition by Ellington. The album was released on United Artists Records in February 1963 . It was re-released as a CD in an expanded form in 1998 and 2005 by Blue Note .

History of the money jungle session

In 1962 Duke Ellington undertook several solo projects without his orchestra ; first an octet album with Coleman Hawkins in August and a joint album with John Coltrane on September 26, both for the young label Impulse! . A week earlier he also met two musicians from the jazz avant-garde of the time, Charles Mingus and Max Roach, who had both worked closely with each other since the early 1950s. a. for their joint label Debut . While for Ellington in the Coleman Hawkins project "the similarities of the musical ideas outweighed so much that a problem-free cooperation was guaranteed, Coltrane and Ellington collided whole worlds", according to Ellington biographer Hans Ruland. For him, "the figure of integration between these worlds" was "Mingus, who was as fond of the tradition of Fats Waller or Duke Ellington (...) as he was of contemporary jazz of the fifties and sixties, which Mingus ultimately helped shape."

Years earlier, Ellington and Alan Douglas had discussed the possibility of recording an album in Paris. When Douglas was responsible for jazz productions at United Artists, Ellington called him and suggested combining him with the next generation of musicians. Ellington agreed with the producer that the 63-year-old pianist should be presented with two “next-generation modernists” in order to “prove the compatibility of the completely different musicians.” It was the bassist's first trio session since his recordings for Jubilee with Hampton Hawes and Dannie Richmond . In a 1974 downbeat interview , Mingus recalled : “I got a call from the record company; then we met Duke in his office and discussed what exactly he wanted to do. "

Despite the adverse circumstances of the session - Mingus fell out with Max Roach, refused to continue playing and could only be persuaded to continue playing by Ellington's flattery; In addition, the meeting had been scheduled at relatively short notice, Charles Mingus was the one who "stole the show from the nominal chairman of the meeting." "He played complicated counter-melodies and dizzying off-tempo runs in every register ." Weber and Filtgen lead the dispute between them Mingus and Roach said that "they developed a different timekeeping."

Duke Ellington during a concert break in 1965

Mingus is said to have been extremely irritable during the entire Ellington session, be it because of the collaboration with his idol or because of current professional problems. In a moment he slipped the case over his bass and was about to leave the studio, Ellington later recalled.

Mingus: "Man, I can't play with this drummer!"
Ellington: "Why, what's going on?"
Mingus: "Duke, I always adored you and what you did musically, but you will have to look for another bass player."

Duke Ellington was able to lure him with the fact that United Artists had placed a full-page ad for Mingus for the upcoming Christmas edition of the Billboard . That he was more convinced of his qualities as a bassist than as a composer, he answered a few years later when asked whether Mingus should be part of "the Ellington School": "Well, that's what he says."

The album

Ellington himself commented overall on the recording of the album:

“It was one of those mythical moments when the muses of three different musicians merged into one. The first shot was already on. I was electrified with joy. "

The music of the original album

Ellington had written several new pieces especially for this session; “None of the four titles: Money Jungle, Les fleurs Africaines, Very Special and Wig Wise , however, is typically Ellington.” The latter composition was “a bow by Dukes to the musical genius of Thelonious Monk . Monk's world of thoughts and feelings, with their choppy melodies and chromatic harmonics, couldn't be traced more accurately. ”There were also two Ellington classics, Solitude and Caravan .

“Thundering opening of the album” is the title track “Money Jungle”, “a blues that could be classified somewhere between post-bop and avant-garde ” and contains “experimental passages”. The ballad Fleurette Africaine is an " impressionistic sound painting (...) in honor of those flowers whose full beauty only bloom in the secret of the African jungle". For Ruland, it testifies to “the almost spiritual harmony of three musicians that is seldom captured in a studio.” Ellington remembered the bassist's playing: “Mingus, with his eyes closed, fell in a harmonic groove and added counter-melodies in a way as if he had played the number all his life "

After the “lively upbeat blues” Very Special , the subject of which is only briefly alluded to in order to flow straight into Ellington's improvisations, comes the more “conventionally played” Warm Valley , a “lovely ballad that is inextricably linked to Johnny Hodges . "

After the quick number Wig Wise , in which the "angular, pointed, descending lines" the Monk covers are recognizable, follows the Ellington classic Caravan , "thundering percussion and wild bass lines result in a playing posture that is more exuberant than usual." LP ends with a solo by Ellington on Solitude ; the pianist introduces the theme and after three choruses with the accompaniment, the improvisational part begins .

Charles Mingus in New York in 1976

More recordings of the session

In his review of the new edition of the session, Jim Santella went into the other, partly previously unreleased pieces. Switch Blade begins Charles Mingus with a longer solo interlude that “ prepares the mood for a slow, nightingale- like piano swinger ”; on the other hand, A Little Max (Parfait) is a feature for the drummer with a "range of textures". Like many other pieces in the session, the REM Blues is a simple blues over which the trio spreads its interpretations; the abbreviation REM stands here for the Roach-Ellington-Mingus present. The even slower alternate take catches the good mood of the three musicians even earlier.

Reception of the album

Ken Dryden wrote of Money Jungle in Allmusic , which gave the album the second highest rating, that Duke Ellington had surprised the jazz world in 1962 with “his historic trio session” with Mingus and Max Roach: “Not in a way by simply revising older compositions ; the majority of the LP concentrates on music that he wrote especially for this session. ”A“ jewel of this session ”for the critic is the“ fragile, in a certain way agonizing ballad Fleurette Africaine , in which Mingus' bass lines flow and roachs restrained drumming combine to create the mystery of an Ellington work ”.

Richard Cook and Brian Morton also gave the album the second-highest rating and commented that the frequent use of the 12-bar blues scheme - such as in Money Jungle or Very early - can probably be explained by the urgency with which this gathering took place Had come; "These (pieces) sound improvised". In contrast, La Fleurette Africaine evidently evolves from a simple melodic conception. The interpretations of the older Ellington numbers Warm Valley and Caravan are less productive ; "With the latter, it is unclear whether it was due to Mingus' unfamiliarity with the changes [of the composition] or the upset of the bass player, which Ellington later reported."

Hans Ruland, on the other hand, is critical of “this record, [which] lacks Ellington's charm for a long time” and expressed his “ambivalent relationship” with the title track Money Jungle in particular : “Even if the first impression is one Although not anarchist, but largely senseless chaos' has given way to the feeling that a new way to make music together has been shown here, I know of no other Dukes recording that puts me in such a restless, destructive mood as this amelodiously constructed blues in C. Ellington lovers will surely agree. "

For the Mingus biographers Horst Weber and Gert Filtgen, Money Jungle is “one of the most interesting piano records in jazz. Everything is just right: the mood, the choice of compositions, the cast of three equal musicians, as well as the interaction between the musicians. ”The“ usual cliché would not arise here: here the pianist as leader and there the rhythm servants ”. Rather, Money Jungle is “a real joint effort, a result of team spirit.” The amazing thing about the recordings is that the mentioned disagreements in the “time feeling” between Mingus and Roach “were not a real handicap, since both musicians played Ellington imaginatively and Nevertheless, it was a brilliant session because both totally linked to Ellington. "

Max Roach, 1979

Brian Priestley highlights the trio album in the extensive Ellington discography; “The pianist and his two respectful but demanding companions go out of their way.” Most of the material is improvised, apart from Fleurette Africaine . A number of Ellington hits, especially Caravan , are powerfully renewed. In his Mingus biography, the author described Mingus' bass playing as an “excellent summary of his work so far” and gave an outlook on the freer playing of string instruments in jazz.

Ralf Dombrowski expresses himself in a similar way : Although “the sum of distinctive people is idiosyncratic”, he presented “Ellington as a surprisingly versatile pianist”, who with this album “was able to underline his importance as a soloist also for modern jazz.”

For Wolfgang Knauer it was “a spontaneous session in which the freedom of the three musicians was in the foreground, an astonishing musical equality in view of the big names (and egos) of the three participants. You can hear this very clearly on the original album: there is no usual piano trio playing here; too much do the voices of Mingus and Roach give equal comments and thus determine the atmosphere of the whole thing. "

The All About Jazz website voted the album 85th in the list of the 100 best jazz albums.

Rolling Stone magazine voted the album 10th on its list of The 100 Best Jazz Albums in 2013 .

Further effect

In 2010 the album Money Jungle - Ellington Orchestrated by the hr big band was released . In the same year pianist Vijay Iyer recorded Fleurette Africaine with reference to the 1963 trio session.

Edition history

The United Artists album, which is typically short at half an hour, was re-released by Blue Note Records around the previously unreleased and rediscovered by Michael Cuscuna pieces A Little Max (Parfait) (2 takes), Switch Blade , REM Blues and Backward Country Boy Blues as well as an "Alternate Take" from Solitude expanded. The analog three-lane tapes were transferred to digital tape. For the publication in 1987 (Blue Note CDP 7 46398 2) the order of the original LP was canceled. It was only for the extended new edition in 2002 (Blue Note 38227) that the tracks were reworked (24-bit mastering) and the order of the original album was restored, supplemented by another four “alternate takes” (from Money Jungle , REM Blues , Switch Blade and Solitude ) at the end of the CD.

LP Title (1963)

  • United Artists Records UAJ 14017 or UAS 56632, Solid State SS 18022.
  1. Money Jungle (Ellington) - 5:20
  2. Fleurette Africaine (African Flower) (Ellington) - 3:36
  3. Very Special (Ellington) - 4:26
  4. Warm Valley (Ellington) - 3:32
  5. Wig Wise (Ellington) - 3:20
  6. Caravan (Ellington / Juan Tizol ) - 4:12
  7. Solitude (Ellington, Mills , DeLange ) - 5:33

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Billboard February 9, 1963, p. 28.
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Hans Ruland: Duke Ellington - his life, his music, his records. Pp. 144-148.
  3. ^ Edwin Pouncey: Alan Douglas: The Man Who Sold the Underworld. ( Memento of the original from March 2, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Wire Magazine. 161 / July 1997 (PDF; 5.6 MB). @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.douglasrecords.com
  4. ↑ a b c d e Morton Cook: The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD. P. 461.
  5. ↑ a b c d e f Priestley: Mingus - A Critical Biography. P. 137 ff.
  6. ↑ "[...] playing complicated Counterpoints and dizzling out of the tempo runs in every register [...]"
  7. ↑ a b c Weber / Filtgen, p. 132 ff.
  8. ↑ a b c d e Review of Ken Drydon's album in Allmusic , (accessed August 13, 2010)
  9. ↑ a b Ralf Dombrowski: Basis-Diskothek Jazz. P. 71 f.
  10. ^ Dryden: Allmusic. In the original: "Thunderous percussion and wild basslines complement a wilder-than-usual approach to Caravan ."
  11. ^ Review of Jim Santella's album (2002 CD edition) in All About Jazz , (accessed August 13, 2010).
  12. ↑ Dryden, in the original: “The gem of the date is the fragile, somewhat haunting ballad 'Fleurette Africaine', where Mingus' floating bassline and Roach's understated drumming add to the mystique of an Ellington work that has slowly been gathering steam among jazz musicians as a piece worth exploring more often. "
  13. ↑ Priestley, Ellington Article.
  14. ↑ a b HR information  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , (accessed on August 13, 2010)@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.hr-online.de  
  15. ↑ Top 100 list at All About Jazz , (accessed July 25, 2015)
  16. ↑ Rolling Stone: The 100 Best Jazz Albums . Retrieved November 16, 2016.
  17. ↑ Review of the Vijay Iyer album Solo on All About Jazz , (accessed August 13, 2010)
  18. ↑ a b Notes by Michael Cuscuna on the 1987 edition (Liner Notes)