Charles Mingus as Private Eye Jazz Composer

[jazzbo]

4 hours ago, Teasing the Korean said:

 

These kinds of distinctions are not as cut and dried as some may believe.  If you believe that film music can't be "art," I would suggest that you spend some time with Jerry Goldsmith's Chinatown score.

Well, there's that...

I didn't say it can't be art, but it's nothing that really interests me, including the music of Chinatown. There's lots of types of art and pieces within types of art that don't interest me.

 

Edited March 20, 2022 by jazzbo

[JSngry]

Or...

As long as we're talking about parallel universes... let's imagine one in which a business structure exists inside a culture that would even begin to consider employing the person of Charles Mingus as we know him...and one in which he would be enthusiastic about engaging.

This is the problem with the narrative of jazz changing to an all-inclusive, kumbaya world in which we all love Louis and everybody because really, we're all the same and because of that, their story is our story.

No we're not and no it's not.

Let's start there and then see what happens.

[Guy Berger]

5 hours ago, Teasing the Korean said:

Mingus may have lived much longer if he had a steady day gig and health insurance.

Probably not, given the typical ALS prognosis?

[mhatta]

2 hours ago, sgcim said: Cassavettes used Mingus for Shadows.That was about it AFAIK. I think the Debut box includes some recordings Mingus prepared for Shadows -- "Nostalgia In Times Square", "Alice's Wonderland", "Self-Portrait In Three Colours" and an untitled percussion ramblings with flute.  The last one sounds like an early Sun Ra.  Mingus might be a terrific film score composer, but I guess he would have serious issues to meet deadlines... Although it has already been completed, Bosch on Amazon Prime made good use of jazz, probably because the original author, Michael Connelly, is a jazz fan. I think it would have been good to use the Mingus music in this kind of noir detective drama with Titus Welliver as the main character. I think there was a scene that a young black detective listens to the music playing in Bosch's car and says, "I like this. Who is this?" then Bosch (middle-aged white) said, "It's a guy named Sonny Rollins," which made me laugh quite a bit.

Edited March 20, 2022 by mhatta

[Teasing the Korean]

2 hours ago, jazzbo said:

I didn't say it can't be art, but it's nothing that really interests me, including the music of Chinatown. There's lots of types of art and pieces within types of art that don't interest me.

It's a great big InterWebz.  You are cordially invited to participate in the threads that interest you, and to ignore the threads that don't interest you, like this one, obviously.

[Chuck Nessa]

Perfectly appropriate to complain about shit too.

[bertrand]

9 hours ago, felser said:

Yeah, "Boogie Stop Shuffle" was the one I thought of immediately when I saw the topic.

Compare it to the Spiderman theme.

[jazzbo]

2 hours ago, Chuck Nessa said:

Perfectly appropriate to complain about shit too.

Lord knows TTK does plenty of that.

[porcy62]

13 hours ago, Teasing the Korean said:

Jon Hamm?  

Yeah or Liev Schreiber.

[Gheorghe]

Anyway Mingus composed for Movie Scores: Todo Modo and Cumbia and Jazz Fusion. Todo Modo was never played live, but Cumbia was always anounced on stage as something "we just recorded, it´s from a Movie Score ....". When he played it live as we witnessed, the records still was not out. 

Maybe if he had lived longer, he might have done another music for a movie. In the late 70´s he had become very very popular and he was asked to compose for a ballet group (Pilobulus) and for Symphony with Jazz Sextet in Buenos Aires, where he had played in June. 

So, if he had not contracted that terminal desease, there would have been a lot of work for him besides touring....., 

The first person that told me about jazz music as a possible movie theme is my wife, when we saw the  Blue Note Label Documentary Film and when there was Miles´ "Weird Blues" she said it might be for some of those old police film series back then....

[Teasing the Korean]

11 hours ago, jazzbo said:

Lord knows TTK does plenty of that.

If you can fin a thread in which I categorically dismiss a genre as "drivel," please post a link.  Of course, strictly speaking, film music is an application and not a genre.

14 hours ago, JSngry said:

Or...

As long as we're talking about parallel universes... let's imagine one in which a business structure exists inside a culture that would even begin to consider employing the person of Charles Mingus as we know him...and one in which he would be enthusiastic about engaging.

This is the problem with the narrative of jazz changing to an all-inclusive, kumbaya world in which we all love Louis and everybody because really, we're all the same and because of that, their story is our story.

No we're not and no it's not.

Let's start there and then see what happens.

Henry Mancini wrote about opening doors for Quincy Jones.  There was an assumption at the time that black composers should score "black" films.  They were reluctant to have him compose for strings, for example.  

At any rate, Duke did Anatomy of a Murder, and Count Basie wrote the theme to M Squad, so things were starting to change.

Edited March 20, 2022 by Teasing the Korean

[Teasing the Korean]

"Bird Calls" would also work for some intense chase scenes.  

 

[JSngry]

5 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

They were reluctant to have him compose for strings, for example.  

Yeah, "they". "They" are still here.

[Teasing the Korean]

6 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Yeah, "they". "They" are still here.

"They" are worse now, as things have become openly regressive in the US, at least in certain states.  But we are teetering into a topic that we're not supposed to discuss here, correct?

At any rate, I have only a few Mingus titles on CD, and I need to explore the LPs to find more examples of his private eye sound.

Edited March 20, 2022 by Teasing the Korean

[JSngry]

Whatever stories get told, they go through "them".

Business is always one extra layer. Or barrier, as the case may be.

[jazzbo]

4 hours ago, Teasing the Korean said:

If you can fin a thread in which I categorically dismiss a genre as "drivel," please post a link.  

It was complaining that I stated you do plenty of.

I did not state all film music was drivel. But I do feel that in an alternate universe that Mingus became a film music composer what he wrote would not compare to what we have had from him in this universe outside the film industry.

Edited March 20, 2022 by jazzbo

[Teasing the Korean]

8 minutes ago, jazzbo said:

I did not state all film music was drivel. 

I will grant you that, but within the context of the conversation, it may have been easily inferred.  Are we friends yet?

[jazzbo]

Sure, we weren't not friends. We have different musical interests and posting styles. So be it.

[Teasing the Korean]

2 minutes ago, jazzbo said:

Sure, we weren't not friends. We have different musical interests and posting styles. So be it.

All is good, and sorry if I took your words out of context.  Let's have drinks next time I am in Ohio.

[jazzbo]

Sorry, I don't drink.  Seriously I don't, and I don't hang out among drinks and drinkers.

[Teasing the Korean]

36 minutes ago, jazzbo said:

Sorry, I don't drink.  Seriously I don't, and I don't hang out among drinks and drinkers.

I won't hold that against you.  I will be happy to enjoy a tofu sandwich with you.  

But this begs the question: How did you get into jazz?  Don't jazz and drinks go together?

Edited March 20, 2022 by Teasing the Korean

[jazzbo]

I got into jazz in part because my parents had jazz records in their collection, and in part because a Peace Corps volunteer my Dad directed in Swaziland as the first Director there gave me three Atlantic mono jazz LPs from a box Atlantic Records sent all volunteers of LPs. He didn't like them. They were Another Dimension, Blues Shout and Sister Salvation. I became obsessed with jazz when I returned to the US in rural Ohio and found Filles De Kilimanjaro and In a Silent Way at the library. American rock and pop didn't do much for me after five years in Africa. 

Honestly, I don't believe jazz and alcohol have to have much to do with each other. That said I was a normal young man who drank a little in my youth, but I saw both personally and professionally after that drink destroy the life of a close friend, and endanger the livelihood of coworkers, and I gave it up. Haven't missed it.

I don't eat tofu sandwiches. I live out in the country, across the road from a state wildlife preserve. I don't get around much any more other than to visit my father once or twice a week in hospice.

Edited March 20, 2022 by jazzbo

[Teasing the Korean]

3 minutes ago, jazzbo said:

I don't eat tofu sandwiches. 

OK, that's it.  I don't associate with people who don't eat tofu sandwiches.

Just kidding.  Maybe we can meet for some green juice, like Elizabeth Holmes drank.  

Positive vibes to your father.  

[Teasing the Korean]

This would also be great for a club sequence, with the protagonist and his date at a table watching the performance.

 

[bertrand]

Not Mingus, but I always thought the first side of Jackie McLean and Co. Would be a great soundtrack for a spy movie.