CD Review

Thelonious Monk is not your ordinary Jazz act. He’s not so much ahead of the curve as he is all around it. And people tend to have strong feelings about him, good or bad - so there’s nothing I can say to you if you don’t like his music.. The only advice I can give is to keep listening, eventually it will click. That’s the way it happened for me. Monk’s playing is like a James Joyce novel, filled with humorous quotes and musical jokes, some lost to time, some still apparent, sometimes known only to himself.

Monk inhabited the world that Miles and Coltrane only visited on their best nights. He often seemed to be in a trance onstage, the music controlling him. He would rise from the piano and begin to twirl around in ecstatic revelry. Many people thought he was insane, but in reality he was a kind of incredible natural genius, unable to do anything but produce complex innovative music. On stage he seemed as if he was driven by some supernatural force, channeling his delight.

For those who haven’t heard it, his music is like nothing else. Many players can imitate the Monk style, with hard work and practice, but no one could duplicate it. He was eccentric, sure, but many geniuses are. Rhythmically, Monk’s music was like running down a steep incline, hitting each frantic step just in time, slightly out of control, as if the whole affair might be set to rolling. On 'Round the World, songs like “Blue Monk”, “Epistrophy” and “Rhythm A Ning” have that feeling.

Melodically his music was equally challenging, chords and tones that shouldn’t quite fit always somehow do. Charlie Rouse, Monk’s longtime sax player was the only person who could compliment Monk’s unconventional style. The two collaborated for much of their careers, switching bass players and drummers whenever necessary. Together their boppy grooves were groundbreaking marvels.

As far as I’m concerned the biggest obstacle to enjoying Monk’s music is dealing with poor recording quality. All of the music on this disc is from the early sixties: the songs were recorded forty years ago. Nowadays it’s easy to forget exactly how difficult it was to get a recording of a live concert. CDs were science fiction in the sixties, as were cassette tapes. These recordings sound unbelievably good, given their age. I felt like my living room was transformed into a smoky Jazz club. The bass and drum solos are loud and round, and the piano and sax, the living breathing soul of the quartet: crisp and sharp. What a joy.

This is a perfect album for the beginner. It’s so clear you can almost hear the early sixties, with its cigarettes and clinking glasses. The recordings are an amazing gift from the past. There are plenty of hits to recognize and fine bopping runs to follow. It’s also a must have for the serious Monk listener. You will weep when you hear the clarity.

As if that wasn’t enough, this album comes with a bonus DVD with more tunes recorded in London. All of it is astounding, flawlessly recorded. The Master seemed a bit subdued at first; possibly he was self-conscious before he slipped into his trademark trance. You really get a sense of what it was like to be there. I had a friend who used to say, “When you read Joyce, open to any page, pick any place to start and read it out loud.” Similar advice applies here. Set your CD player on random shuffle, turn it up loud and let it roll. You may look up several hours later to find you were in a trance. Time has no meaning in Monk’s rhythmically enhanced world.