Trying to learn the tune Let's Call This. Thought to myself I haven't played this in ages. Sounding great. NP: Thelonious Monk - Quartet Plus Two - At The Blackhawk
Grant Green - I Want To Hold Your Hand (1966) Original '66 mono Blue Note BLP 4202 (NY labels, VAN GELDER stampers) Recorded March 31, '65 at Rudy's Hank Mobley - tenor sax Larry Young - organ Grant Green - guitar Elvin Jones - drums A continuation of the cohesive Green-Young-Jones rhythm section from Talkin' About, Into Somethin' and Street of Dreams, with Mobley featured on 5 of the 6 numbers. This album is sweet and yet still advanced; relaxed and yet still stimulating. One thin slice of heaven sitting on my record shelf. These guys just make it all look and sound so easy!
I'm not much of a jazz player, but it usually seems to go that whenever I try to learn a Monk tune I end up like . Which is in stark contrast to the way I end up like when I listen to Monk.
This is exactly the sentiment that I was alluding to in my previous post about Monk. Whenever I listen to Monk, I think "Oh yeah, that's it, of course, it's just like that." Then I try to play a tune and I'm all flummoxed. Although, I do experience this same pattern when I try to play any jazz, not just Monk .
Nina Simone - Little Girl Blue (1958) 2015 Analogue Productions CAPJ 083 SA hybrid stereo SACD mastered by Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound Gorgeous sound on this SACD, a perfect companion to this beautifully solitary, cold rainy night. Paired with a cold bottle of San Pellegrino.
George Braith - Musart (1967) 2013 Concord/Real Gone Music RGM-0167 mastered by Joe Tarantino First spin A recent acquisition and glad I picked this one up. A little exotic but still in perfect keeping with tonight's subdued mood. Very nice stuff. Going to spend some time writing after this.
Thelonious Monk - In Italy (1961) Recorded live at Teatro Lirico, Milan, Italy, April 1961 with Charlie Rouse (tenor sax), John Ore (bass), Frankie Dunlop (drums).
The ESOTERIC CIRCLE (1971) Jan Garbarek (tenor sax), Terje Rypdal (guitar), Arild Andersen (bass), Jon Christensen (drums). Produced by George Russell. (Flying Dutchman - 1971)* * (re-issued by Arista/Freedom in 1976 as Jan Garbarek - The Esoteric Circle)
Sonny Criss - This Is Criss! (1966) Alto Saxophone – Sonny Criss Bass – Paul Chambers Drums – Alan Dawson Piano – Walter Davis
Over the years of trying to learn Monk tunes I have come to see patterns he returns to lot in his tunes. Standard Be-pop or Monk variation of the blues. He likes to use a ii-v-1 in the bridge and some tunes he likes the descending chord pattern on a few bars like on Ruby My Dear and Let’s Cool One. Then there is the quick little ascending note to the main note of the key or chord of the tune. Ex: quickly playing the A note before landing on the B flat or the D before the E flat in a tune based in the B flat key. What makes Quartet Plus Two at the Blackhawk so interesting is that there are a couple tunes on here that are not standard Monk set list stuff in Let’s Call This, Four In One and San Francisco Holiday (instead of a set list of say Blue Monk, In Walked Bud, Well You Needit and I Mean You). Add in that he had three new people to show the charts and teach the tunes to before a live audience recording with the pressure on speaks volumes to Monk as a professional and a leader. I can’t say what the issues were with the sessions that were supposed to be with Shelly Mann for this date and if anyone in particular was as fault (I am sure Orin would say Monk could have his difficulties sometimes) but listening to this it sounds like it was helpful having Billy Higgins on drums on this night, his calm and cool playing probably went a long way to making this session a success.
I've been trying to find information about these, they're always at one of my local shops. Youre a top Google result so...pretty famous. I should probably just roll the dice and try one out.
Bobby Hutcherson – Spiral (Blue Note Connoisseur) — Bobby Hutcherson - vibraphone, marimba; Harold Land - saxophone; Stanley Cowell - piano; Reggie Johnson - bass; Joe Chambers - drums; two compositions by Chambers and one each by Hutcherson, Land and Cowell; 11/11/1968; on two-fer with Medina
You mean like a quick ascending grace-note kind of thing? One thing that I try to throw in for a Monk effect is to occasionally throw in minor or major 2nds played as double stops to accentuate phrases here and there. Generally speaking, I feel comfortable reading a sheet and comping through the chord changes, but when it comes time to solo I mostly just end up sticking heavily to the chord tones which starts to sound stale quickly. As was said, the greats make it sound easy, just like they're speaking to you in logical phrases that make up sentences which in turn make up a larger story, while I feel like I'm stumbling to think of the words constantly and the ones I choose add up to poor grammar and an illogical story. Yeah, some of my favorite Monk tunes are the lesser played ones, I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of his live recordings, but I'm not aware of many, if any, live recordings of tunes like Locomotive and We See, and I can only think of one live recording on one of the Riverside albums of Coming on the Hudson. Are you familiar with Peter Bernstein at all? I really like his guitar takes on Monk tunes, he has a trio album called Monk that I'm very fond of. Speaking of the tune We See and Peter Bernstein, I just found a nice live video of Peter Bernstein and Brad Mehldau playing this one.
