Founded by Sue Mingus in 1986, Let My Children Hear Music / The Charles Mingus Institute is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to preserve and promote the compositional legacy of Charles Mingus through education, publishing, performance, and archival preservation.

2021 14th Annual Charles Mingus Festival (Virtual)

February 11 - 15, 2021

Congratulations

BATTLEGROUND HIGH SCHOOL Combo
BOSTON LATIN SCHOOL Big Band
DREYFOOS SCHOOL OF THE ARTS Jazz Ensemble 1
JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER Youth Orchestra
NEWTON SOUTH HIGH SCHOOL Jazz Ensemble
RIO AMERICANO HIGH SCHOOL’S QUARANTET

Sophie Dunér

Ruby Farmer

Ido Leibowitz

Jackson Spellman

Zachary Williams

Roman Ullian

Adam Lord

Aidan Higgins

Coleman Stanton

DOWNLOAD PDF SCHEDULE

Presented by Let My Children Hear Music/The Charles Mingus Institute, the 13th Annual Charles Mingus Festival hits the digital stage! Mingus Virtual Fest provided a platform for young musicians to explore their voices through Mingus Music, with participation from students from across the country.

Presented online for the first time, this year’s Virtual Festival brought the experience of Mingus Music and New York City to students, musicians, and audiences across the globe to experience virtual performances, instrumental master classes, skill-building workshops, interviews, historical films, retrospective of 12 years of Mingus Mondays at Jazz Standard, and a look into Mingus' epic masterwork, Epitaph. 

Learn how to record at home, gain perspective from Mingus's sidemen and collaborators, and develop musicianship with members from the Grammy award-winning Mingus Big Band and Mingus Orchestra. 

New this year submission categories expanded to include virtual ensembles, and individual activities including arranging, contrafact composition, contrafact transcription, performance transcription, and lyric writing.

This year’s print-at-home festival program, Changes Too, was modeled after Sue’s cultural magazine, Changes, and included articles, games, essays, and insights into the wild world of Charles Mingus.

The Festival streamed at CharlesMingus.org on Thursday, February 11th through Monday, February 15th, 2021, with additional events on Zoom. 

Thank you deeply to all who contributed to this event: musicians, clinicians, photographers, videographers, staff, panelists, producers, editors, engineers, galleries, libraries, companies, organizations, individuals, family members, teachers … and most of all … students!

Charles Mingus is recognized as a major 20th century composer, whose entire works have been acquired by the Library of Congress - a first for jazz, and a first for an African-American composer. Mingus left behind the largest legacy of composition in American music after Duke Ellington. The Mingus Bands remain devoted to this vast repertoire, and under the artistic direction of Sue Mingus, play to great critical acclaim around the world.

The Mingus Bands are available for concerts, residencies, master classes and commissions.

Donate to Let My Children Hear Music/The Charles Mingus Institute:

Founded by Sue Mingus in 1986, Let My Children Hear Music / The Charles Mingus Institute is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to preserve and promote the compositional legacy of Great American Composer Charles Mingus through publishing, education, archival preservation and performance.

Contributions are tax-deductible to the fullest extent allowable by law.  To make a donation, please send a check or money order to the address below or use the PayPal button above.