Review: Monk's Music

Well, I made a fuss about doing music reviews, so here it goes......

I figured I'd start with an easy one: Thelonius Monk's 'Monk's Music' (Riverside RCD-242-2 or original vinyl on Riverside RLP 12-242, although good luck finding the latter). This is the perfect Jazz album - I think the best ever recorded. Sounds like a bold statement doesn't it? Well, it might be, but this record has an awful lot going for it.

If you've never heard of Monk, or maybe you've heard the name but you don't know anything about him, you should. Since he first appeared in the late 1940s Thelonious Sphere Monk (1917-1981) has been an iconic figure. A strange guy who wrote strange music, often ignored or maligned by critics and the public who just didn't get his odd melodies. He was one of the towers of early Bebop, but was generally overlooked by the public in favor of its hipper and more accessible stars, Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. For a long time his followers were mostly musicians who would come to see him after hours at Minton's in Harlem. He was almost invisible as a performer throughout most of the late 1940s and much of the 1950s, a period when his creative powers were in ascendancy, due to the loss of his New York City Cabaret Card, which was required at the time to play in any establishment that served liquor. Jazz in New York at the time was mostly played in nightclubs and so Monk was unable to play live in the jazz capital of the world. When his card was finally restored in 1957 he spent spent several months playing a now legendary series of gigs at New York's Five Spot Cafe with John Coltrane. The world finally did take notice of this so-called 'new thing', in the late 50s and especially during the 60s when he was recording for Columbia Records. He was lionized, but his fame came almost fifteen years after his contemporaries, and it only happened when the world caught up with him; definitely not the other way around.

Fortunately for us, there were some people during the 1950s who saw the value of Monk's oddly dissident melodies and flat fingered playing style, most notable the folks at Riverside Records who recorded Monk throughout this period of time with little commercial success. Players like Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane make early career performances on these dates and there isn't a bad record in the lot. This album though, 'Monk's Music' is the best of the best. This septet is a rare confluence of talent and great material, put together almost seamlessly. Recorded in one day on June 26th, 1957, this is - as I've already said - the perfect jazz album.

The Players:

Thelonious Monk - On this date Monk was at the height of his powers both as a leader and player.
Coleman Hawkins - Hawkins, born at the turn of the century and a contemporary of players like Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong, is the Wiley old fox in the room. On this date he is playing music that is out of his element and experience. Nevertheless he acquits himself well. Hawkins is recognizable on the record as the softer and breathier sounding of the two tenor saxophones. The date is an interesting juxtaposition between Hawkins - who is credited with cutting the first extended jazz solo on a record (Body and Soul, about 1927) with the new up and coming monster ......
John Coltrane - This is a young Trane, not yet fully realized as a player and still playing somewhat within the boundaries of the melody. Recently fired from Miles Davis' quintet for his heroin use, Coltrane is nevertheless a BIG sound on this record and he gets some real workout time here.
Art Blakey - Blakey is most often remembered today for his 'Jazz Messengers' group that played with different lineups for better than 30 years, introducing players such like Winton Marsalis to the world. Blakey had an affinity for Monk's weird music (the Messengers at one point cut an entire record of Monk's music with Monk) and, in my opinion, was his best musical companion. Blakey just fit into Monk's world and understood the music better than anyone else Monk ever played with. Check out the solo on 'Well, You Needn't' where Blakey keeps a subtle, on-the-mark time with the hi-hat while playing a totally arrhythmic solo around it. Brilliant.
GiGi Gryce - A great alto sax player in his own right, but its hard to shine when you're in a room with Hawkins and Coltrane.
Ray Copeland - Makes some nice trumpet contributions, but again, next to Trane and Hawk....
Wilber Ware - Bass. Ditto.

The key to this date is the Monk, Hawkins, Coletrane triumbverate; Monk at the absolute peak of modernism, combined with Hawkins representing a somewhat old fashioned approach to playing, juxtaposed to the up and coming inovations of John Coltrane. The date is spectacularly important in the history of jazz, not simply because of who was on the date, but because they represented and melded three essentially separate and distinct eras of the music with spectacular success, all the more amazing given the obtuse and challenging nature of the Monk compositions they were working with.

This record opens with a hymn. 'Abide With Me' is played in beautiful harmony by only the horn players. It comes off as an invocation, as though it were a moment of dedication before the plunge into baptismal font - a last glimpse of the familiar before the listener is pulled into Monk's different musical world. It works perfectly.

The rest of the album is all Monk originals. On 'Well You Needn't', in addition to the aforementioned Blakey drum solo, is a bold introduction to John Coltrane. The other players actually call him out by name and he delivers a powerful statement. 'BIG' is the sound of Coltrane's horn. It fills the room with authority, volume and technical mastery, if not the peak of his innovations which are still several years away.

'Ruby, My Dear', a slow ballad, features Hawkins the whole way through. Rather than try to play to the off kilter phrasing and rhythm, Hawkins plays a beautiful improvisation of the melody, in the process pulling it towards him, meeting somewhere between avant-garde and old school. The result works with satisfying brilliance

'Off Minor' has one of the most fabulous off key trumpet notes - in the opening statement of the melody - ever put on a record. No foolin'.

The balance of the album is every bit as engaging. Monk's playing is - as always - spare and correct; his solos are the perfect statement of the silence around the notes as much as the notes themselves. For Monk, the triumph of this album is the arranging of the players and the originality of the songs. Angular (a much abused adjective for describing Monk) and unusual, but always tight, coherent and accessible, his strength here lies in his ability to keep the ensemble focused on the music and not on the players working out as individuals. There are stellar individual performances here, but the power of this record lies in unit of the band rather than in its individual parts.

This record is now just a month shy of being 49 years old and it is every bit as powerful and fascinating as it has ever been. If you can find a better jazz record let me know, I'd love to hear it.