Grammy Nomination for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album: Mingus Big Band: Charles Mingus Centennial Sessions

Listen now, streaming on all platforms and digital purchase on Bandcamp or Apple. Volume 2 will be released soon and a volume 1 and 2 will be released together on vinyl and CD.

This is the seventh album nomination for Mingus Big Band, after a win for Live at Jazz Standard.

Mingus was nominated four times, for Best Original Jazz Composition Black Saint And The Sinner Lady (1962), Best Original Jazz Composition Tijuana Moods (1961) Best Jazz Performance - Soloist Or Small Group (Instrumental) Tijuana Moods, and for the album notes to Let My Children Hear Music, released in 1971. He also received a posthumous Lifetime Achievement award in 1997.

Mingus Big Band Grammy Nominations:

1995/38 Gunslinging Birds
1996/39 Live in Time
2002/45 Tonight at Noon (also includes Mingus Orchestra)
2005/48 I am Three (also includes Mingus Orchestra and Mingus Dynasty)
2006/49 Live in Tokyo at Blue Note
2010/53 Live at Jazz Standard (WON)

And the latest:
2023/66 Charles Mingus Centennial Sessions

The number has been misstated in the past, perhaps the confusion came from other awards in 1997 and 1998:
1997/40 Charles Mingus received a Lifetime Achievement award (18 years after his death)
1998/41 Sue Mingus for liner notes on Charles Mingus Passion of a Man

And this interesting research note: Sue Mingus stated that Mingus complained that the only time he was nominated for a Grammy was not even for his music but for the liner notes to Let My Children Hear Music in 1972. According to the Grammy.com, Mingus was nominated 3 other times, for compositions and performance, in 1962 and 1963. We wonder if Mingus himself never knew this, as Sue came into his world and business just after that time, the awards were fairly new so perhaps not as newsworthy as today, and the PO Box was often overflowing.

1962 5th Annual
Best Original Jazz Composition
Tijuana Moods (Single)
Best Jazz Performance - Soloist Or Small Group (Instrumental)
Tijuana Moods

1963 6th Annual
Best Original Jazz Composition
Black Saint And The Sinner Lady (Single)

1972 15th Annual
Best Album Notes
Let My Children Hear Music (Album)