JAZZ VIDEO REVIEWS : Vitality and Joy From ‘Mingus Sextet’

***** Charles Mingus, “The Charles Mingus Sextet” (Shanachie, 60 minutes, $24.95.). Gold mine time. This black-and-white concert video of a 1964 Norwegian television broadcast features Mingus in peak form with a legendary sextet of Johnny Coles (trumpet), Clifford Jordan (tenor), Jaki Byard (piano), Dannie Richmond (drums) and Eric Dolphy (alto/bass clarinet) a few months before Dolphy’s death at 36. The sound is crisp and clear and the visuals aren’t flashy but neither miss anything crucial nor fixate on superfluous things.

The balanced program includes the up-tempo “So Long Eric,” the gospel-tinged ballad “Orange Was the Color of Her Dress, Then Blue Silk” and a version of “Take the A Train” that moves to an entirely different track when Byard’s solo suddenly jumps to stride and triggers an angular, atonal Dolphy solo. But what really sticks is the sheer vitality of the music throughout and the palpable joy the musicians display in its on-the-spot creation.