Better Git It in Your Soul - by Krin Gabbard (Hardcover)

About the Book

"This biography traces the output of jazz master Charles Mingus--his recordings, his compositions, and his writings--highlighting key moments in his life and musicians who influenced him and were influenced by him. As a young man, Mingus played with Louis Armstrong as well as with Kid Ory. Mingus also played in bands led by Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Lionel Hampton, Red Norvo, Art Tatum, and many others. He began leading his own bands in New York City in 1955. Eric Dolphy, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Jimmy Knepper, Jackie McLean, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Cat Anderson, and Jaki Byard are among the many distinguished jazz artists who made music with Mingus during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. In addition to leaving behind a large collection of compelling recordings by large and small units, Mingus was also a talented writer. His autobiography, Beneath the Underdog: His World Composed by Mingus, is unlike any other book by a major jazz artist. Mingus creates vivid portraits of the many people who passed through his life and tells his story with compelling prose. Mingus also wrote a good deal of poetry and prose, all of it reflecting his unique vision. In 1977 he was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. After several months of steady deterioration, he died in 1979 in Mexico"--Provided by publisher.

Book Synopsis

Charles Mingus is one of the most important--and most mythologized--composers and performers in jazz history. Classically trained and of mixed race, he was an outspoken innovator as well as a bandleader, composer, producer, and record-label owner. His vivid autobiography, Beneath the Underdog, has done much to shape the image of Mingus as something of a wild man: idiosyncratic musical genius with a penchant for skirt-chasing and violent outbursts. But, as the autobiography reveals, he was also a hopeless romantic. After exploring the most important events in Mingus's life, Krin Gabbard takes a careful look at Mingus as a writer as well as a composer and musician. He digs into how and why Mingus chose to do so much self-analysis, how he worked to craft his racial identity in a world that saw him simply as "black," and how his mental and physical health problems shaped his career. Gabbard sets aside the myth-making and convincingly argues that Charles Mingus created a unique language of emotions--and not just in music. Capturing many essential moments in jazz history anew, Better Git It in Your Soul will fascinate anyone who cares about jazz, African American history, and the artist's life.

From the Back Cover

"Krin Gabbard is one of the finest stylists writing about jazz today, and Better Git It In Your Soul finds him at the top of his game. The writing is crisp, charming, and funny, a pleasure to read. The author's love of this immensely rich body of music comes through on every page."--Thomas Brothers, author of Louis Armstrong: Master of Modernism

"One of the reasons that the great musician Charles Mingus is not better known is that the raw complexity of his life and the scale and sweep of his work seem to demand a whole team of artists and scholars to fathom and explain his importance in several different arts. Finally, Krin Gabbard--biographer, musician, film scholar, and literary critic--steps in with a book worthy of this twentieth-century master, and one that will surprise even those familiar with his legacy."--John Szwed, author of Billie Holiday: The Musician and the Myth

"Gabbard conveys the complexity of Mingus's life and his changing representation in an engaging and accessible book. A fascinating and thought-provoking read, this book is a must for anyone interested in jazz."--Tony Whyton, author of Beyond "A Love Supreme" and Jazz Icons

Review Quotes

"Gabbard . . . addresses Mingus's music and legacy in comprehensive fashion and is full of impassioned and well-reasoned arguments."-- "Jazz and Culture"

"Gabbard's careful attention to new and underutilized resources and dedication to placing the many dimensions of Mingus's existence in their larger contexts should indeed enhance readers' appreciation of Mingus as a musician, composer, arranger, writer, poet, and bandleader."-- "Notes"

"14 of the Best Gifts for a Music Snob Who's Heard Everything: Krin Gabbard's bio is as idiosyncratic as the great jazz bassist and composer that is its subject. There aren't many places you can go to read comparisons between Mingus and Philip Roth as well as detailed musical analysis of his epochal and hard-swinging compositions."
-- "New York Magazine, The Strategist" (12/15/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"'Better Git It In Your Soul draws the reader to listening to its subject's productions. If already familiar with Mingus' music, a reader may return to favorites with fresh ears and deeper insights. . . . Gabbard's greatest personal contribution to understanding Mingus is his contextualization of events through his own broad, well-informed perspective."-- "DownBeat" (4/1/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"A solid addition to the literature of jazz."-- "Booklist" (3/3/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"An important contribution to not only the study of Charles Mingus but also of the evolution of postwar jazz."--STARRED REVIEW-- "Library Journal" (3/1/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"Gabbard examines the musical career of one of the giants of Jazz, Charles Mingus, offering a look at the man beyond his sensationalized musical career and personal mythology."-- "Publishers Weekly" (11/27/2015 12:00:00 AM)

"Krin Gabbard uses his own unique perspective to illustrate the famous musician's life and genius."--Darcy Peters "Smooth Jazz News" (9/1/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"Offers several lenses through which to view Mingus and his music--the milieu in which he lived, wrote and played; literary life; closest musical associations; and as a coda his experience in film. . . . There is much in Better Git It In Your Soul to limn one's understanding of and approach to Mingus' tremendous body of work as well as the challenges he faced and orchestrated as a black artist in America."-- "The New York City Jazz Record" (3/1/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"This is a wonderful book! This book completely absorbed me. . . . You really took me in with your own emotional palette."

-- "NPR/On Point with Tom Ashbrook" (2/26/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"This isn't simply a new telling of Mingus' life story, although Gabbard does an excellent job of that in just under 100 concise and nicely paced pages. Gabbard also takes a deep dive into specific aspects of Mingus' output. Most notably, he performs forensic work in exploring how Beneath the Underdog came to be."-- "PopMatters" (4/25/2016 12:00:00 AM)

"Will likely long stand as the definitive account of the genius, and enigma, that was this great bassist, bandleader, and composer. Certainly no one has heretofore delved as deeply and thoroughly into what made him tick."-- "W. Royal Stokes Blog" (1/31/2016 12:00:00 AM)

About the Author

Krin Gabbard retired after thirty-three years of teaching at Stony Brook University, and he now teaches in the jazz studies program at Columbia University. His previous books include Hotter than That: The Trumpet, Jazz, and American Culture and Jammin' at the Margins: Jazz and the American Cinema. He lives in New York City with his wife, Paula, and he is busy playing his trumpet and writing a memoir about his parents.