Song With Orange

The Mingus Big Band, is performing all this week at Ronnie Scott's in Soho. Last night's opening set was electrifying - the band seemed if anything even more cohesive and telepathic than it did last year, and there were excellent solos by Frank Lacy, Wayne Escoffery, Conrad Herwig, Jaleel Shaw, David Kikoski... the list goes on and on. Highlights of the set were a bluer-than-usual "Goodbye Porkpie Hat" featuring Escoffery, a new arrangement by bassist Boris Kozlov of a previously unheard Mingus work, "Tensions", and the well-known "Song With Orange", which was the closing number. Frank Lacy also outdid himself on vocals during the evening. The band, which has been together since 1991 when it was founded by Sue Mingus (who introduced last night's sets), is now one of the most powerfully creative and inventive ensembles on the jazz scene today, while still working strictly within the principles and praxis of its original remit: to play, perform and develop the enormous and varied legacy of compositions left by Charles Mingus at his death in 1979.