Charles Mingus contained multitudes, but his native language was protest

Fifty years ago this October, Charles Mingus was one of about three dozen major figures in Black American music honored during a convocation at Yale University. "The Conservatory Without Walls," as this event was titled by its organizer, music professor Willie Ruff, was part of the kickoff for a Duke Ellington Fellowship Program at Yale. Ellington himself — the magisterial composer-bandleader, a prime source of inspiration to Mingus — was on hand to receive the first medal. At one point, Mingus joined an epic jam with five fellow bass stalwarts: Milt Hinton, Ray Brown, Slam Stewart, George Duvivier, and Ellington's bassist at the time, Joe Benjamin.

A bit later, somebody called in a bomb threat, prompting authorities to start evacuating people from the hall. Mingus, alone among his cohort, refused to budge. "Racism planted the bomb, but racists ain't strong enough to kill this music," he barked at a police captain. "If I'm going to die, I'm ready. writer Claudia Roth Pierpont that it also "became a protest song, as the performance just kept going on and on and getting hotter. In the street, Ellington stood in the waiting crowd just beyond the theatre's open doors, smiling."