By: Jaclyn Breeze
Thelonious Monk was a composer and pianist, born in 1917 and raised in Manhattan. He began learning piano when he was 6 years old. He mostly learned stride piano, a common technique in ragtime. From ages 10-12 he studied under the pianist and concertmaster for the New York Philharmonic, where he learned to play classical piano. By his early teens he was playing at parties, churches, and had won several “amateur hour” competitions at the Apollo Theater.
Monk started his first band at 16, playing at schools and restaurants, and started touring with an evangelist at 17. In his 20s, he was hired as the pianist at Minton’s Playhouse, a Manhattan nightclub. His work here helped form the bebop style with many of the leading jazz soloists of the time. Mary Lou Williams was one of his mentors and spoke of how inventive he was and how he stood out from the other composers because he came up with his own ideas instead of just using musical ideas he had overheard from others, which was common at the time. He also stood out as a pianist because he used his right and left hand equally, as where most pianists used an active right hand much more. Because of his differences from other musicians, many did not like his music at the time it was recorded and released, even though today his work is hailed as some of the greatest recordings. In the late 1950s, he had a regular show at the Five Spot Cafe, and from there people began to really catch on to his music. By the early 1960s he had a mostly-permanent quartet and began touring the world and was signed to Columbia records. He was the third jazz musician to be featured on the cover of Time Magazine. As he got older he became more physically ill and creatively drained, and he eventually quit playing altogether. A few years later, he passed from medical complications.
Today, Monk is known as a genuine master of jazz, and many of his compositions make up the core of the repertoire and are frequently performed. He is the subject of several documentaries, biographies, scholarly studies, and televisions tributes, and won a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and a Pulitzer Prize.
Listen to some of his work here:
Straight No Chaser
Book: Mysterious Thelonious by Chris Raschka
Find it at these Monroe County Public Libraries, or have it delivered to a library near you! (Hold/delivery fees have been removed as of Jan. 2024)
Rochester Central
Word Search:
