Thelonious Monk Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited

When he set foot on the stage of Club Doelen on Oct. 28, 1967 in Rotterdam, Thelonious Monk had just turned 50. 15 years later, he disappeared from the music scene and spent his 6 final years in New York, at Pannonica de Koenigswater's, and never touched a piano again.

Thelonious Monk (piano/arranger) began his illustrious relationship with Riverside Records on the pair of July 21 and 27, 1955, dates needed to complete the eight sides for Plays Duke Ellington (1955). Monk commands a trio that also presents the talents of Oscar Pettiford (bass) and Kenny Clarke (drums) on all the tracks sans "Solitude," which appropriately enough features an unaccompanied piano. The delicacy and inherently intricate melodies that Duke Ellington is best known for are perfectly matched to Monk's angular and progressive interpretations…

Celebrating 100 years of Thelonious Monk: includes A Collective Personnel Of: Sonny Rollins, Art Blakey, Max Roach, Gary Mapp, Julius Watkins, Percy Heath, Willie Jones, Ray Copeland, Frank Foster, Curly Russell, Tommy Potter And Art Taylor…

On each of his first three recordings for Riverside, Thelonious Monk included a solo piano presentation, and for many listeners, these were the highlights of each recital. And so it was decided that Monk's fourth Riverside recording, Thelonious Himself, would be composed entirely of solo interpretations; well, almost. Like a great actor finding heretofore obscure layers of meaning in a familiar soliloquy, Monk takes familiar themes such as "April in Paris," "I Should Care," and "Almost Alone" and distills them down to a single essence. Where most pianists would simply expand upon the tune (or employ the chord changes as a showcase for their own variations), Monk keeps everything focused on thematic materials. For his final selection, "Monk's Mood," the pianist insisted on adding bassist Wilbur Ware and an up-and-coming tenor saxophonist named John Coltrane…

Most of the titles on this album are derived from Thelonious Monk's vast catalog of bop standards. Both co-leaders are at the peak of their respective prowess with insightful interpretations of nearly half a dozen inspired performances from this incarnation of the Blakey-led Jazz Messengers. This combo features Art Blakey (drums), Johnny Griffin (tenor sax), Bill Hardman (trumpet), and Spanky Debrest (bass).

Most of the titles on this album are derived from Thelonious Monk's vast catalog of bop standards. Both co-leaders are at the peak of their respective prowess with insightful interpretations of nearly half a dozen inspired performances from this incarnation of the Blakey-led Jazz Messengers. This combo features Art Blakey (drums), Johnny Griffin (tenor sax), Bill Hardman (trumpet), and Spanky Debrest (bass). Immediately, Hardman ups the ante with a piledriving lead during "Evidence" that underscores the heavy-hitting nature of this particular jazz confab. Monk counters with some powerful and inspired runs that are sonically splintered by the enthusiastic – if not practically percussive – chord progressions and highly logistic phrasings from the pianist. The inherent melodic buoyancy on "In Walked Bud" contains a springboard-like quality, with Griffin matching Monk's bounce measure for measure.