Bum be de BOMP. Be dop bop be da BOMP. Bum be de BOMP. It's impossible to hear the opening lines of Charles Mingus' version of Bobby Timmons' "Moanin" and not feel immediately patched into the energy and anger that marked the great bassist's career. Tonight that riff comes out of the massive baritone sax of Clare Daly, the fairy godmother of saxophonists, who blows with the fury of a tempest. She's part of one of my favorite horn sections in town, and her riff fills and thrills all of us gathered at the elegant supper club, Minton's.
Minton's was the birthplace of bebop, back in the 1940s. It's where Thelonius Monk, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Lester Young developed the sounds that propelled the century. Then, in 1974, the place burned down, its history silenced in the ashes. Recently it was reborn with the help of Dick Parsons and chef Alexander Smalls, who also run the restaurant next door, The Cecil, named Best New Restaurant by this very magazine in 2014.
Read more at Esquire
0 Comments