The Mingus big band return to Ronnie Scott’s this week.

Spirits descending in the sheer joy of Charles Mingus, with only Ellington and Monk in the same league in his lifetime, this most complete composer whose body of work manages to speak to a new generation as the spokes of each new cycle of history swish by, the video above has the bass goliath with Gerry Mulligan on Mingus’ own ‘Goodbye Pork Pie Hat,’ his beautiful homage to Lester Young.

The MBB line-up changes from time to time in a kind of roster and it is the relatively unknown Theo Hill as the pianist scheduled this time around among the outstanding personnel. Boris Kozlov is again at the heart of the sound.

Next clip above is the classic satire excoriating Orval Faubus, the governor of Arkansas who infamously called out the National Guard to stop school integration at Little Rock in the 1950s.

Again from the definitive declension of 1959’s Mingus Ah Um, ‘Boogie Stop Shuffle’ is a tune the Mingus Big Band, run by the bassist’s widow Sue, often use as a superhero of a theme when the audience is settling. 

Snowbound at the moment Times Square, above a hip ‘Nostalgia in Times Square,’ was once the home of the Big Band at the Fez for years. Now they play the Jazz Standard while on home ground in New York, a venue that, like most of the metropolis, was shut down last night because of what meteorologists are calling Snowzilla. 

Finally, listen to ’Group Dancers’ from the ultimate Mingus desert island disc, The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady.