Popmatters: SAY IT LOUD! 100 TIMELESS PROTEST SONGS

March 26, 2024 Shannon Manning

90. Charles Mingus: “Haitian Fight Song” (1957)

... 'Haitian Fight Song' endures as the best articulation of the inequities that consistently inspired his best work. The song is, of course, about everything (as is pretty much all of Mingus’s music), but it’s mostly about the tensions and turmoil inherent in the lives of the dispossessed. ...'Haitian Fight Song' is one of the most angry yet eloquent, ardent yet erudite and — this is the key — most jaw-droppingly swinging and kickass compositions ever. It is a statement that speaks volumes, and not a single word is spoken. Significantly, this was quite a few years before artists’ statements regarding racial strife became commonplace or mainstream. But this is just one of many instances where Mingus was ahead of the crowd. Mingus led several big bands later in his career, but listening half a century later to the sheer force of sound this quintet made remains a revelation. It is a hurricane that blows through your life and changes everything.

Sean Murphy