Monk’s and Bud’s tunes; learning from records

Barry calls Monk the most prolific composer of the century and singles out his ballads as works of art: Reflections, Pannonica, Round Midnight, Ruby My Dear. He first heard Monk on 78s, Round Midnight among them.

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York24:4025:1225:45

Many Monk tunes are new melodies on standard changes; Evidence, for example, is built on Just You, Just Me. That made them easy to take up: players learned Monk’s melodies and put them on changes they already knew, and when Monk called for rhythm they played I Got Rhythm.

The last train to Monk: an interview21:08Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland22:34

Monk wrote vehicles on many standard forms, something on Lady Be Good, his own rhythm-changes tune and his own blues, so you can play nothing but Monk tunes all night and have a ball. After Monk died, Barry did exactly that at his first gig, at the Angry Squire: Monk tunes all night and no other song.

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York26:18The Spirit of Bebop29:4630:59

Ask the young pianists of Barry’s day who was best, he said, and while some might name Art Tatum, most would say Bud Powell; he named Wynton Kelly, Bill Evans, John Lewis, Hank Jones and himself among that generation. Young players today, he noted, name many different stars. To Barry, Bud’s technique and creativity were the best of all, every Bud record had something you had never heard before, and his generation learned to play mostly by listening to Bud.

Accepting the Bruce Lundvall Visionary Award7:56Interview: Detroit, Bud Powell and the shuffle9:3710:45The last train to Monk: an interview10:15

Barry told how friends knocked on Bud Powell’s door one morning while he was playing Embraceable You. He wouldn’t go out with them, and when they came back that night he was still playing it. Listen to Bud, Barry said, and you will learn something, because he plays things nobody else has played.

Accepting the Bruce Lundvall Visionary Award8:309:05

When Barry was young you owned one take of a performance: one take of Bud Powell’s Un Poco Loco, one of Dance of the Infidels. They learned to play from those single takes. Today’s students have ten or twenty alternate takes and, he said, learn less from them. Yet every take of Bud has something different, which for Barry showed Bud’s genius.

Interview: Detroit, Bud Powell and the shuffle4:03The last train to Monk: an interview10:55

A listening assignment from Barry: find somewhere quiet and listen to the piano on the Cootie Williams band records on which Eddie ‘Cleanhead’ Vinson sings, such as Cherry Red Blues and Is You Is or Is You Ain’t My Baby. The young Bud Powell solos all through them, doing things no pianist had done before, as if Cootie had let him do whatever he liked.

The last train to Monk: an interview18:3619:14

Listening to a Bud Powell blues, Barry explained why Bud doubled the time in bars seven and eight and got lost: he was such a searcher. Doubling up can confuse anyone, Barry included: you get caught in the double, everything seems to go twice as fast, and you end up in the wrong place. For Barry, Bud’s beauty lies not in right or wrong notes but in the feeling of an imagination searching.

Interview: Bud Powell and teaching singers7:548:289:01

Barry remembered one of Bud’s last gigs at Birdland, when Bud was in bad shape. He seemed to play on top of the keys: you could hear him singing along and only now and then a note sounded, yet you could tell he was playing. Barry described it as gliding over the keyboard, and said that is what a pianist has to end up doing.

The Spirit of Bebop17:56

A student who spoke at Barry’s funeral said that even asleep in a car, Barry would wake up when a Bud Powell CD came on and ask to hear a choice phrase again.

Barry Harris Funeral57:13

Barry questioned why Bill Evans came to be treated as the greatest thing and told the listener to go and listen to Bud Powell instead. The recording of this remark is hard to make out, so only this general point is clear.

On Bill Evans and other pianists0:090:55

Barry described seeing Monk in person: Monk would play the theme, then get up and dance, and when Charlie Rouse stopped playing he came right back in at the piano without missing a beat.

Interview: Detroit and after8:42

Barry said a lot of Monk rubbed off on Bud Powell, including the whole-tone scale, which Bud took from Monk. Monk was not strictly a bebop pianist but a complete pianist who could stride. And the young players took to his music: ‘Round Midnight, Monk’s Mood, Rhythm-a-ning and more.

The last train to Monk: an interview19:5420:28

Because Bud Powell was close to Monk, you can hear Monk in Bud’s sound; and since Barry’s own sound comes from Bud, it has a little Monk in it too. Barry showed that he sometimes slips in a particular note just because it gives a Monk-like flavour.

The 2016 workshop, part 3: Monk’s tunes, not his style2:504:00

Barry would not advise learning jazz by studying Monk’s playing: it is too unorthodox and individual to be a method, almost like a composition you can’t improvise on. What Monk really gave us are his songs, especially beautiful ballads like Ruby, My Dear and ‘Round Midnight, which Barry wished he could write. So play Monk’s songs, but don’t try to play like him. Some of his devices are usable, such as running down in thirds, and he used the whole-tone scale a lot. Study Monk only after you have learned everything else.

The 2016 workshop, part 3: Monk’s tunes, not his style0:002:507:008:12

Barry lived in the same house as Monk, in New Jersey, for about ten years. He thought Monk withdrew because the calibre of musicians changed as his peers, such as Prez and Coleman Hawkins, died. Barry said Monk more or less lay in Barry’s bed for those ten years and seldom touched the piano, which stood just outside the room.

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York24:40Interview on Italian television1:08The last train to Monk: an interview22:1923:13

One day Monk decided they would play the old song My Ideal, and he made Barry keep going: Monk took a chorus, Barry took a chorus, in tempo, over and over, for over an hour. Barry’s count varies between tellings, from about fifty to about a hundred times each. They stayed in E-flat the whole time; the point was not changing keys but playing something different each time. Barry always wished it had been recorded.

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York28:37Interview on Italian television1:40The last train to Monk: an interview21:40Jazz theory, part 7: Monk and Stella by Starlight0:33

The message Barry took from the My Ideal session was that you have to practise playing. To try it his way, choose one tune, stay in one key, and play chorus after chorus in tempo, aiming to play something different each time.

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York28:37Jazz theory, part 7: Monk and Stella by Starlight0:33

Monk once heard Barry playing and recognised him from the way he ended a song.

Jazz theory, part 7: Monk and Stella by Starlight0:331:07

Barry was due to play the piano part at a big concert and asked Monk whether he was sure he didn’t want to play it himself; Monk gave no answer. As another speaker in the film tells it, two minutes before the curtain, with Barry waiting to be introduced, Monk appeared from nowhere, walked past him onto the stage and played for two hours. Barry joked that he got paid for nothing, and said Monk played well. He added that the Baroness Nica looked out for all the jazz musicians and helped them.

The Spirit of Bebop33:3034:03