The Thelonious Monk Orchestra at Town Hall (CD)

• Category:  Music  »  Jazz  »  Piano
• Format: CD   Learn more about the CD format using Tower WIKI.
• Release Date: May 2, 1989
• Label: Original Jazz Classics
• UPC: 025218613521
• WAPI (Tower ID): 106646537
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Thelonious Monk Orchestra: Thelonious Monk (piano); Phil Woods (alto saxophone); Charlie Rouse (tenor saxophone); Pepper Adams (baritone saxophone); Donald Byrd (trumpet); Robert Nothern (French horn); Eddie Bert (trombone); Jay McAllister (tuba); Sam Jones (bass); Art Taylor (drums).

Recorded live at Town Hall, New York, New York on February 28, 1959. Originally released on Riverside (1138). Includes liner notes by Orrin Keepnews.

Digitally remastered by Joe Tarantino (1989, Fantasy Studios, Berkeley, California).

THE THELONIOUS MONK ORCHESTRA AT TOWN HALL presents the music of the great composer and pianist in a unique milieu. Monk nearly always recorded with a small group, a setting suited to his spare approach to melody and soloing. Fortunately, Monk's compositions proved eminently adaptable to a ten-piece orchestra, as this album clearly demonstrates.

The Town Hall concert came at a signature moment in Monk's career, just as greater jazz audiences were beginning to understand his genius. At times dismissed as a crackpot (an image Monk helped perpetuate through his idiosyncratic dress and difficult temperament) whose minimalist playing was mistaken for ineptitude, Monk simply persisted until the world came around to him, which it finally did in the late 1950s. By 1959 he was winning awards and headlining concerts at prestigious venues (such as Town Hall). All the while, Monk stayed true to his muse. On TOWN HALL, Monk's playing is set against Hall Overton's expert big band arrangements of six Monk compositions. There isn't a dull moment on TOWN HALL; highlights include a ten-minute "Monk's Mood" and an Ellington-esque take on "Friday the 13th." Among the stellar soloists are Donald Byrd, Charlie Rouse, and Phil Woods.

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