I say play your own way. Don’t play what the public wants. Play what you want and let the public pick up on what you are doing, even if it takes them fifteen or twenty years. - Thelonious Sphere Monk

October 29, 2007 12:21 AM

Here today, gone tomorrow or so...
Blue Monk
Blue Monk
Blue Monk
Blue Monk

Round Midnight
Epistrophy
Ruby, My Dear
Off Minor
Don't Blame Me
Light Blue
LuLu's Back In Town
Rhythm-A-Ning
In My Solitude

See also Gary Giddins on Thelonious Monk
Fannishly: The Thelonious Monk Website
Eurofannishly completist: Birth Certificate from Round About Monk
Officially: The Monk Zone
--whose The Official Thelonious Sphere Monk Website - Webcasts are in RealVideo format, hence the obligatory Media Player Classic aka Real Alternative links.

posted by y2karl (13 comments total)

Great quote from Monk as your title, y2karl. It's in fact a kind of guiding principle for me.

It's funny you should make this Monk post now: the other day while watching the clips from the Bill Evans FPP, a thought passed through my mind, "what other great jazz pianist could I do an FPP on who would be a kind of polar opposite of Evans? An 'ebulliant, head-up legendary jazz piano' kind of pianist..." Monk was the instant choice, of course. But I didn't get it together to do it. I'm glad you did.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 1:22 AM on October 29, 2007

Thanks a lot.
posted by nicolin at 2:43 AM on October 29, 2007

Song Trellis chord changes for Blue Monk. Midi of such with hi-hat and ride cymbal accompaniment here.

Mudcat Cafe forum: Playing with wrong chords-how's it work?

pdf lead sheet for Round Midnight

The beauty of building, dwelling and Monk: aesthetics, religion and the architectural qualities of jazz.
posted by y2karl at 6:05 AM on October 29, 2007

Some liner note stated that Monk's wife called him "Melodious Thunk", which I've always thought was a pretty great name. Monk's music is what I often whistle as I go through the day, more off-key than on. Thanks for this.
posted by Hobgoblin at 6:23 AM on October 29, 2007

Nice to see a bit of a young Henry Grimes (until the fucking camera goes out to the boats & the narration comes in).

I had the chance to hear him a couple weeks ago here in Seoul with Alfred Harth, Choi Sun Bae, Tristan Honsinger, Tobias Delius, Louis Moholo-Moholo, and Harada Yoriuki. The show was so-so, but Grimes was fantastic.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 6:33 AM on October 29, 2007

Blue Nun.
posted by StickyCarpet at 6:41 AM on October 29, 2007

Magnificent. Monk's the best. Thanks, y2karl.
posted by languagehat at 6:50 AM on October 29, 2007

You've done it up righteous again, y2karl.

TM and the rest of the "bebop generation" of jazz composers were so far ahead of their time that their music is still avant garde today.
posted by rdone at 6:59 AM on October 29, 2007

In those situations when I'm forced to pretend I have a child, I always tell them it's a girl. She's three now--precocious as hell. Pannonica. Her name's Pannonica.
posted by dobbs at 7:08 AM on October 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

My favorite Monk tribute, from Victor Wooten: "The Loneliest Monk".
posted by surplus at 9:47 AM on October 29, 2007

It begins to tell,
'round midnight, midnight.
I do pretty well, till after sundown,
Suppertime I'm feelin' sad;
But it really gets bad,
'round midnight.

Memories always start 'round midnight
Haven't got the heart to stand those memories,
When my heart is still with you,
And ol' midnight knows it, too.
When a quarrel we had needs mending,
Does it mean that our love is ending.
Darlin' I need you, lately I find
You're out of my heart,
And I'm out of my mind.

Let our hearts take wings'
'round midnight, midnight
Let the angels sing,
for your returning.
Till our love is safe and sound.
And old midnight comes around.
Feelin' sad,
really gets bad
Round, Round, Round Midnight
posted by hortense at 10:34 AM on October 29, 2007

Thanks for this, y2karl. It'll be next weekend before I can actually listen, as my work comp doesn't do sound, but I'm singing "Blue Monk," the first blues I ever learned on piano, and one we'd play every weekend back when I had a band in college.

...and, sorry hortense, but the lyrics to Round Midnight always struck me as awful. It wasn't really meant to have words.
posted by koeselitz at 4:12 PM on October 29, 2007

I used to feel the same way until I heard Carmen McCray sing it ,and found out Thelonius wrote them.
posted by hortense at 4:19 PM on October 29, 2007