A History Of Blue Note Records: 1948

Thelonious Monk Quartet – July 2 1948

Michael Cuscuna – Thelonious Monk and Milt Jackson – BNJ-61012 Liner Notes

According to Lorraine Gordon, then wife of Alfred Lion, Monk was a very agreeable artist. When Lion mentioned that he would like to attempt a vocal 78, Monk had no objections. "All The Things You Are", which Monk often played live at that time, and "I Should Care" were cut and issued on 78. When a double album of Monk on Blue Note was being prepared in the mid seventies (BN-LA-579-H2), an alternate take of "I Should Care" was accidently used. So both versions are included here.

Hagood was a typical black baritone of the forties in the vein of Billy Eckstine and Herb Jeffries. Actually, it is quite amusing to compare his stiff phrasing with the adventurous, pliable, hip work of Monk and Jackson. They are not only the soloists, but display their empathy but sharing the accompaniment duties and reading each other's minds at all times. Listen on "All The Things You Are" how Milt starts an arpeggio at the end of the first 8 bars that Monk picks up midstream and carries through on the piano.

The alternate of "I Should Care" precedes the master. Monk's 8 bars solo is a piece of wizardry, but since Hagood anticipates the downbeat on Monk's intro, Blue Note decided to use the next take.

Although the very special relationship between Milt Jackson and Thelonious Monk is one that would flourish rarely in the late forties and early fifties at short club engagements and impromptu jam sessions, the fruits of that relationship have thankfully been preserved permanently in the archives of Blue Note. This album is a welcome chapter. Unfortunately it marks the final chapter, except for the Miles Davis all star session of Christmas Eve, 1954.

Ira Gitler - Thelonious Monk – The Complete Genius Liner Notes BN-LA-579-H2 1975

Next we move to July 1948 and the alchemy that occurs when Monk and Milt Jackson got together. Evidence is Monk's version of Just You, Just Me but to let it go at that is too simple an explanation. Steve Lacy has called it "a glorification of the way Monk comps" and, indeed, the spare, skeletal outline he lays down is a fine example of how he implies much with little. His later recordings of the same song show how he solidified the idea first recorded here.

I Mean You, co-credited to Coleman Hawkins (Hawk recorded it in 1946) is another shining example of Monk-Milt interplay. Epistrophy, co-authored by Monk with Kenny Clarke, was originally called Fly Right. It stemmed from an idea that Charlie Christian helped Kenny conceive. Cootie Williams recorded it in 1942 but Columbia didn't issue that version until decades later. Monk used it as his theme in the Five Spot days of the 1950's when Coltrane was with him. The drummer in that group was Shadow Wilson, the same man who was on this original recording.

On that same July 1948 day, two vocals were done by Kenny "Pancho" Hagood, an Eckstine and Vaughan-influenced baritone who had sung with Gillespie's big band and Parker's group. I Should Care and All The Things You Are were released on a 78 but have never been on LP Even if you do not care for Pancho's sometimes straining intonation — I happen to dig his singing but that's probably because I'm an unregenerate bebopper — Monk's (and Milt's) accompaniment and beautiful solos, especially Monk's oblique gem on All The Things, are worth the admission price.

Mysterioso, the final instrumental selection from this date, is presented here in two takes and comparisons are not odious in this instance, Notice how Monk uses elements of his "walking" theme in his accompaniment to Jackson —paring it down to an essence — and the way in which he unifies the whole performance by what he plays in his solo and how he and Milt close the piece.

Bob Blumenthal – Milt Jackson – Wizard Of The Vibes RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes – 2001

While the vibist enjoyed working relationships with many illustrious leaders in these years, including Gillespie (as both a big-band and combo sideman), Howard McGhee, Tadd Dameron, Woody Herman and Miles Davis, none produced music on the level of the vibist’s immortal July 2, 1948 encounter with Thelonious Monk. This quartet date is one of the most celebrated of Monk’s career, both for the quality of the original compositions and the exceptional empathy between the two featured players. The melodic/percussìve, nature of the vibes, plus Jackson’s own brilliance as an interpreter and improviser, quickly marked him as one of Monk’s greatest collaborators. Drummer Rossiere “Shadow” Wilson, who was swapping seats with Jo Jones in the Count Basie Orchestra and Illinois Jacquet combo at the time, would rejoin Monk in the pianist’s legendary 1957 “Five Spot” quartet with John Coltrane. The reliable John Simmons is on bass.

“Evidence” was an instant classic, although the melody (one of Monk’s most popular at the start of the 21st Century) is never completely stated. It is lurking in Monk’s eight-bar introduction, in his support of Jackson’s solo chorus, and in the great final chorus that ¡s basically an improvised duet. Monk based “Evidence” on the chords of “Just You, Just Me,” arriving at the title through a process of reduction (passing through “Just Us” and “Justice,” the latter being Art Blakey’s preferred name for the piece) that mirrors the way in which his comping reveals the skeletal core of his materials. Simmons throws in some effective double-stops before the first bridge of Jackson’s opening chorus.

The blues “Misterioso” was spelled “Mysterioso” on the original 78, and is another of Monk’s most celebrated masterpieces. Gunther Schuller called it “a summation of Monk’s work up to that time, and, in both composition and solo, a wondrous example of his artistic maturity and his awareness of the challenge of discipline and economy.” One sign of Monk’s genius here is how he takes the interval of a seventh, which concludes the theme chorus of parallel sixths, and uses it to support and expand Jackson’s vibes solo. The master take, which features an additional piano chorus and one of Jackson’s best blues solos, was recorded before the almost-as-incredible alternate.

Kenny Clarke is credited as the co-author of “Epistrophy,” although Ira Gitler has noted that guitarist Charlie Christian also had a hand in the melody. The three-note main phrase is rhythmically identical to “Salt Peanuts,” which Clarke co-composed with Gillespie around the same time. Under the title “Fly Right,” “Epistrophy” was Cootie Williams’s 1942 theme song, and was also recorded by the trumpeter in that year although not released until two decades later. Clarke got the first issued version out in France on the Swing label, from his 1946 52nd Street Boys date. The piano vamp under Jackson’s theme statement would become a closing cue when Monk adopted the tune as his own theme in the ‘50s. Jackson and Monk each solo for 16 bars in that order, yet the pianist does not play the bridge as expected.

Jackson was present on the session where Coleman Hawkins cut the original recorded version of “I Mean You” for Sonora in 1946, though the vibist laid out on that track. On that occasion, Hawkins was credited as co-composer, possibly due to the full chorus of arranged material that breaks up the solos. Here, the focus is more clearly upon the basic composition, which Monk had once titled “Stickball.” Monk’s clusters and whole-tone scales are featured, as is Jackson’s voracious response to the potent chord changes.

The session had actually begun with the two excel lent standards that close the present program. They feature vocalist Kenny “Pancho” Hagood, who had worked with both Jackson and Monk in Gillespie’s 1946 big band and would also be heard with Tadd Dameron (on Blue Note), Charlie Parker and the Miles Davis Nonet. Hagood is quite relaxed on “All The Things You Are,” and receives challenging yet sympathetic support from both Jackson and Monk, each of whom solos briefly before the singer returns in a decidedly Monkish mood (listen to the note he chooses for “star” on the second bridge).

“I Should Care,” one of the era’s most sophisticated ballads, was a favorite among modernists after Frank Sinatra introduced the tune. Johnny Hartman would cover it with Gillespie’s big band in 1949. The alternate, recorded before the master but heard after it, is generally preferable despite Hagood’s early entrance, thanks primarily to the daring Monk improvisation that more closely presages his incredible 1957 solo version on Riverside.

Down Beat 20 October 1948 Volume 15 Issue 21

Epistrophy (which Funk and Wagnalls spell with an “e” on the end) is a form of repetition in which phrases always end with the same word. Where they get the derivation, however, is a mystery since, outside of the repetitive triplet figure that opens it up, there are no two companion notes alike in the whole side.

We have less and less patience with the far-fetched type of composition and inventiveness which are displayed by the much publicized Monk for a very simple reason. Nothing happens. Bud by the quintet is more of a straight bop riffer which attempts to make something happen, but the solos and arrangement are weak. Epistrophy is a quartet side — with vibes and piano. (Blue Note 548)

Down Beat 25 March 1949 Volume 16 Issue 5

Evidence is a quartet side wherein Monk shares the grooves with Milt Jackson’s vibes. Neither solo is either interesting or exciting to us, though the Monk’s whole-tone harmonies and off-cadence rhythm doubtless will appeal to the more atonally minded of the jazz gentry.

One thing you gotta admit— these boys are master mathematicians. How do they ever locate the | beat after two or three out of the four are wandering off into their own rhythmic transgressions? Ruby is a trio side—all piano and all abstract. (Blue Note 549.)