NP: Max Meets Mingus

[robinlandseadel at comcast.net]

An offline conversation involving "Grand Cohen" and asymetrical mirroring led to 
this wicked, wicked post from onetime p-lister and Audio Maven Max Dudious. 
Worthwile for friends of the Arisotcrats and other high-tone examples of the 
musical comedy tradition:

Max Meets Mingus
By Max Dudious
I'm a jack-of-all-trades, master of a few. Sometimes 
I've functioned as publicist for a concert promoter 
named Julian Arthur (a.k.a. "Big Julie"). One night
I got a phone call at an unseemly hour. It was Julie, 
I knew from the operator.

"I have a person-to-person call for Dr. Hackenbush."
"This is he."
"Go ahead, sir."
"Is Item #7 in your contract the sanity clause?"
"Why Julie, everybody knows there ain't no Sanity Claus."
"You remembered our song! Are you busy next weekend?"
"Does Macy's tell Gimble's?"
"I got Chic Corea booked into New Haven on Friday night 
and Charlie Mingus into the Washington Kennedy Center
 on Saturday night and even though I have a split personality, 
I can't be at two places at once. Are you dancing?"
"If you're asking, I'm dancing."

So Saturday morning I set off in my rickety VW microbus 
to pick up Mr. Charles Mingus at Washington's Union 
Station. I didn't know exactly what to expect. I knew his 
music, of course, but I didn't know about his temper. 
He'd been known to punch out side men who had the 
temerity to disagree with him. Mingus came down on 
the train in the first-class section because he was 
uncomfortable on long car trips, or railroad trips for that 
matter, unless he could sit in those sections where each 
person was offered an individual lounge chair. At six feet 
tall, he weighed over 300 pounds. He suffered from Lou 
Gehrig's disease, which later confined him to a wheelchair, 
and, though no one knew it then, he hadn't long to live. . . . 


more below:

http://www.avguide.com/film-music/music/artists/mingus.new.php