Word: monke
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...listening to, and he would always reply, “jazz.” Simple, straightforward, I understood it, and I knew what jazz sounded like. Then one day I heard some music coming from his room and asked him, as usual, and he said, “Monk...
Until about five years ago, I always thought “monk” was a subgenre of jazz, like bebop or swing. After finding out the truth I filed this away as an amusing anecdote, until I heard this recording, and realized that Thelonious Monk actually is his own subgenre...
...create something dissonant and complex, yet somehow still infinitely listenable. It is a capability that sets him apart as a unique performer with more than a few great performances. So, when an engineer at the Library of Congress recently discovered a supposedly lost 1957 recording of the Thelonious Monk Quartet performing with tenor sax legend John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall, jazz fans were foaming at the mouth...
...track off the album is “Evidence,” a Monk standard that likely had jaws dropping all over the auditorium. The tune is fragmented, a series of seemingly random notes that somehow come together. The only discernible part of the melody is one five-note phrase that gives the piece its own personal flavor. The piece is kept together, not by the excellent rhythm section of Ahmed Abdul-Malik on bass and Shadow Wilson on drums, but the interplay between Monk and Coltrane, particularly during the first solo section...
...this talk about Monk’s brilliance shining through during his performances overshadows one fact: that John Coltrane’s performance with Monk rivals that of his first classic solo album, “Blue Train,” released the same year. This is not the cathartic, redemptive Coltrane of “A Love Supreme;” Coltrane, who obviously is inspired by the beauty of Monk’s music, acts as an extension of Monk. He, unlike many bebop players of that time, “gets” Monk, and his solos...