Money Jungle is a studio album by pianist Duke Ellington with double bassist Charles Mingus and drummer Max Roach.
Negative comments have concentrated on differences in playing style among the three musicians, brought about by the generational gap between Ellington and the others, and an argument that led to Mingus leaving the studio mid-session.
[2] Mingus had played with Ellington before, deputising for the regular bassist in the leader's orchestra in 1953, but was fired after four days, following a fight with another musician, Juan Tizol.
[6] According to Roach, the three musicians met the day before the recording, and Ellington told them to "Think of me as the poor man's Bud Powell" and that he would not like to play only his own material.
[7] The recording was made on Monday, September 17, 1962, at Sound Makers Studios in New York City, on 57th Street, between Sixth Avenue and Seventh.
[7] For each piece, according to Roach, he and Mingus were given "a lead sheet that just gave the basic melody and harmony", plus a visual image described by the pianist: one example was, "crawling around on the streets are serpents who have their heads up; these are agents and people who have exploited artists.
The title track is a 12-bar blues[4] that opens with strongly played notes from Mingus, then Ellington joins in with dissonant chords; Roach supports using ride cymbal, snare and bass drum.
[2]: 36 In the final minute, Down Beat magazine observed, Mingus bends the "strings with such force that he makes the instrument sound like a cross between a berimbau and a Delta blues guitar".
[2]: 38 "Fleurette Africaine" is a ballad developed from a simple melody stated on the piano,[4] and features "Mingus's floating bassline and Roach's understated drumming".
[10][11] On "Caravan", Ellington plays the melody in low octaves, adding "Webern-like notes on the top", imitating an orchestral sound.
[3]: 335–6 Critic Thomas Cunniffe suggests that, listening to the tracks in the order in which they were recorded, "one can easily hear the tension building during the uptempo numbers", and that Mingus' temporary departure probably occurred after playing "Money Jungle", which "represents the apex of the group's inner tension, with Mingus plucking the strings with his fingernails, Roach firing up the music with polyrhythms and Ellington laying down highly dissonant chords".
[21] In a five-star review, Down Beat magazine's Don DeMicheal called Money Jungle "astonishing" and described Roach and Mingus as "some of the fastest company around."
[22] Jay Trachtenberg of The Austin Chronicle praised Ellington's playing and "the modernity of his ideas", and said that the album "stands, more than ever, as a masterful meeting of jazz royalty.
[2] Pianist Lafayette Gilchrist states that Money Jungle was the first jazz album that he bought, and that it "sounds like an orchestra being played by a trio.
"[2]: 38 Trumpeter Miles Davis had a different view of the session: in a 1964 Down Beat blind listening test of the track "Caravan", he criticised the record company for putting the three musicians together, saying that "Max and Mingus can play together, by themselves.
[28] Drummer Terri Lyne Carrington led the 2013 release Money Jungle: Provocative in Blue, which includes cover versions of tracks from the original album.