Frankincense Memory

Mingo Lewis - Frankincense

And just like that, it's beginning to look a lot like December! Let's inaugurate it with some fiery Salsa-imbued sounds in honor of someone's birthday, wanna?

This will have to be a relatively short post, not least because there seem to be more photos available online of me than there are of today's b'day guy.

Some of the pix, I can't even tell if it's him or his son, who is also a percussionist and is arguably more well known than his dad.

Anyway his name is James "Mingo" Lewis -- the Senior! -- and he was born this day in 1953.

He is probably most renowned for being one of the main players on the beloved Santana album Caravanserai, among other LPs.

Of course, he made one incredible record in the 1970s, entitled Flight Never Ending, but was a force in particular on the Bay Area music scene in that whole, fertile period.

Here he is at the height of his powers 50 years ago, in two Marin performances at the old Sausalito Record Plant at which so many platters of distinction were waxed.

In the first one he is sitting in with Salsa de Berkeley, and the other one finds him leading his own, blazing Latin fusion ensemble.

Salsa De Berkeley + Mingo Lewis

Record Plant

Sausalito, California USA

9.26.1974

01 Samba de Brazil

02 Coco A

03 Brute Force

04 Puerto Rico

05 Note Critico

06 Cana Y

07 Bird of Beauty

08 Alegria

09 Chara Charinga

10 unidentified title incl. percussion jam

Total time: 55:23

Jon Otis - percussion & vocals 

David Margen - bass, vocals & percussion 

Jeff Narell - steel drums, vocals & percussion

"One Drop" Scott Rasulala - steel drums, percussion & vocals

Marc Roberts - steel drums 

Butch Haynes - congas 

Juan Carlos - bongos 

Dan Regan - trombone, trumpet 

Marc Baum - alto & tenor saxophones

Mingo Lewis - congas, bongos & percussion

320/48k Audio of a KSAN-FM "Live from the Record Plant" broadcast, streamed from Wolfgang's Vault

converted to 16/44 CD Audio, edited, tracked & slightly remastered by EN, December 2024
321 MB FLAC/link below

Mingo Lewis

Record Plant

Sausalito, California

11.9.1974

01 unidentified instrumental

02 People

03 Free At Last

04 Flye Trap

05 Light Within

06 Flight Over Rio

07 Revolution

08 Spanish Fly

09 Frankincense

Total time: 58:01

Mingo Lewis - percussion & vocals

Chuck Burgi - drums 

Brian Godula - bass & vocals

Kinkaid Miller - keyboards & vocals

Pat Thrall - guitar

320/48k audio of a segment from KSAN-FM's "Live from the Record Plant" series, streamed from Wolfgang's vault

spectral analysis is lossless to 20 kHz, making this essentially equivalent to a preFM source

converted to 16/44 CD Audio, edited, repaired & slightly remastered by EN, December 2024
378 MB FLAC/direct link to both shows

I have quite the December planned, but there's a lot going on so I am probably going to post them all as timed things to drop over the course of the month. But I wanted to make sure I squeezed Mr. Mingo into the fun, as he has just turned 71!--J.