Mingus Dynasty

Reincarnation is the 1982 studio album of Mingus Dynasty, the band formed after the death of Charles Mingus in 1979 to keep his compositions in performance, recorded at Barigozzi Studio in Milan on April 5, 6 and 7, 1982 for Soul Note. All six pieces are by Mingus. They run from the opening Reincarnation of a Love Bird, nearly ten minutes long, to East Coasting, Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting, Duke Ellington's Sound of Love, Jump Monk and Ecclusiastics, each between six and eight minutes.

The sextet brings together trombonist Jimmy Knepper, tenor saxophonist Ricky Ford, trumpeter Richard Williams, pianist Sir Roland Hanna, bassist Reggie Johnson and drummer Kenny Washington. Knepper is the closest link to the source. According to the obituary published by Local 802 of the musicians' union in 2003, he began working with Mingus in 1957, played on The Clown, Tijuana Moods and Mingus Ah Um, and after a rift returned for Let My Children Hear Music in 1971, a 1976 Carnegie Hall concert and the last three albums Mingus recorded before his death. The same notice places him in Mingus Dynasty in the 1980s. Side A holds Reincarnation of a Love Bird, East Coasting and Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting; side B opens with the Ellington tribute and continues with Jump Monk and Ecclusiastics, the last at over seven and a half minutes. Giovanni Bonandrini produced the sessions and Giancarlo Barigozzi engineered them; Lee Jeske wrote the liner notes and Susan Mingus took the back cover photograph.

This is the original 1982 Soul Note LP, catalogue SN 1042, a 140-gram pressing that CAM Jazz says was rediscovered in its vaults: original stock, not a reissue.