‘All The Things You Could Be By Now If Sigmund Freud’s Wife Was Your Mother’, by Charles Mingus
As I am leaving for southern France for the next 4 weeks, I wanted to leave you with the best title I have in my 10,000+ library: ‘All The Things You Could Be By Now If Sigmund Freud’s Wife Was Your Mother’, from the 1960 album ‘Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus’.
This recording features Mingus with a quartet, a small ensemble in comparison to many of his other records. The circumstances were unique; this was to be Eric Dolphy and Ted Curson’s last recording with the bassist after playing with him for many months. This personnel crisis, rather than resulting in a stiff and stressed performance, produced one of Mingus’ finest albums.
“All of us who stay sane, stay inside our own cages all the time”, reflected Charles Mingus after seeking treatment at Bellevue and being locked up. Mingus spent years in analysis and even had his psychotherapist write liner notes for ‘The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady’, discussing Charles’s ‘recurrent themes of loneliness, separateness and tearful depression’. Here, Mingus’s quartet deconstructs a series of Chinese boxes devised by the leader to challenge musicians and listeners alike.
And with that, I’ll leave you for now and hope to see you again next month.
All the best,
Rick (jazzpages)
Charles Mingus - Bass
Eric Dolphy - Alto Saxophone
Ted Curson - Trumpet
Dannie Richmond - Drums
