Thursday, May 12, 2016

The Best of Mingus (Exercise in Futility)

Although it's always fraught with danger and bias to construct a "best of" list for any musician or artist, here are my top 50 compositions by/performed by Mingus. The list could be trimmed down to 40 or 45, especially since Mingus recycled some of his tunes multiple times. "Haitian Fight Song" is one well-known example of this habit. 

1. Haitian Fight Song
2. Ysabel's Table Dance
3. Summertime
4. Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting
5. Jive Ass Slippers
6. Pithecanthropus Erectus
7. Love Chant
8. Los Mariachis
9. So Long, Eric
10. Fables of Faubus
11. Celia
12. Hobo Ho
13. A Foggy Day
14. Reincarnation of a Lovebird
15. Better Git It In Your Soul
16. Goodbye Pork Pie Hat
17. Things Ain't What They Used To Be
18. Slop
19. Diane
20. Nostalgia in Times Square
21. Moanin'
22. All the Things You Could Be by Now If Sigmund Freud's Wife Was Your Mother
23. Folk Forms, No. 1
24. Lock 'Em Up
25. Hog Callin' Blues
26. Oh Lord Don't Let Them Drop That Atomic Bomb on Me
27. Passion of a Man
28. Black Saint and the Sinner Lady (Entire Album)
29. Freedom
30. "II B.S.
31. Orange Was the Color of Her Dress, Then Silk Blue
32. The Shoes of the Fisherman's Wife Are Some Jiveass Slippers
33. Devil Blues
34. Free Cell Block F, 'Tis Nazi U.S.A.
35. Cumbia and Jazz Fusion
36. Meditations on Integration
37. No Private Income Blues
38. Work Song
39. Prayer for Passive Resistance
40. Epitaph
41. Fleurette Africaine
42. Work Song
43. Chill of Death
44. Septemberly
45. Eat That Chicken
46. Adagio ma Non Troppo
47. Self-Portrait in Three Colors
48. Don't Be Afraid the Clown's Afraid Too
49. The I Of Hurricane Sue
50. Peggy's Blue Skylight

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