from the Magazine "DU" - © March 1994.

The Monk Sound

by Don Sickler

There are many intriguing sides to Monk, a man who made invaluable contributions to jazz and to the development of music in general. He was definitely his own man with his own musical vision, and his music will always speak best for itself.

One thing I always keep in mind is that even though the music may be very complex, Monk is very direct, and everything he plays means something. There are no wasted notes in Monk.

Some of Monk’s compositions are very simple, meaning not difficult for a musician to play. However, the impact of these compositions is very profound. He also wrote some very complicated music, difficult to play, but equally profound. Monk’s comping (accompaniment behind a soloist either playing a melody or improvising) is very different from most accompanists. His rhythmic approach is unique. It might sound like he is having trouble keeping the time. "Time" describes the underlying pulse of the music, the pulse, the flow, the beat, the swing of the musical situation. Monk had great time. He always knew when it was swinging, and it was always vital to him that his group swung and swung hard. What sets Monk apart from most musicians is that he didn’t play the swing feel himself. The swing feeling had to be there in the group. When the group was really swinging, then Monk could get into his thing, which was to rhythmically react to the music in his own very personal, original way. But it always fits with his musical surroundings.

The main point is: Don’t ever think Monk’s 'time' was bad. He was always in sync with the music, but his way.

There are so many complex aspects to Monk. One of the most fascinating aspects of Monk’s music, and one that is vital to understanding his music, is his approach to sound. Monk’s voice on the piano is one of the most unique in all of music, not just jazz.

Why did Monk approach the piano in this very unorthodox way? It really wasn’t until I started transcribing Monk that it hit me, and all made sense. Monk was all about sound. His harmonic approach is centered around the sound of the notes, and more specifically the sound of each individual note in each of his harmonic structures. The way he balances his notes in his harmonies is obviously critical to him. This is what makes his music so unique to me. After many hours of transcribing his music and countless discussions about his music with his musical friends and colleagues, if I could talk to Monk right now, I would want to talk to him about the science of acoustics.

For more than a year now, pianist Ronnie Mathews has been working with me on several Monk transcription projects. When Ronnie and I work together, he’s the one who plays what we come up with to make sure we have the right notes. We have started many times with different opinions, for example I think Monk’s chord is 6 notes, voiced a certain way, and Ronnie may think it is 6 notes, but a couple of notes are different, and he also thinks the voicing is spread differently. Then starts the fun. Listen, listen, listen, experiment, experiment, experiment. Invariably, what it comes down to is the weight of the individual notes - discovering and understanding which notes are played stronger, and which are played weaker. Each note has its own purpose and its own weight - that’s Monk. The other constantly amazing thing to both of us is how few notes Monk sometimes uses in a voicing. He gets so much richness of sound, often by using a minimum of harmonic elements. This minimal harmonic aspect in Monk’s music is also an interesting theoretical music study in itself, and worthy of many pages of investigation, but not in this short article.

There are so many elements involved in Monk’s sound on the piano. I think sound was a most important fundamental to Monk, more important than technique (meaning speed), for example. Obviously fast technique wasn’t important to Monk, otherwise he would have had to drastically change his physical approach to the piano. It is in trying to understand this approach that we start to see into the secret world of Thelonious Monk. Maybe you are lucky, and can stop reading this article, put a video in your machine and examine Monk’s physical approach to the piano. By being able to see Monk, you gain a new important perspective. There are no wasted notes - every note has ist place and means something. Watch his hands as they produce the sounds - every movement is directed toward how the note will be struck, and thus how it will sound. Note the variations in the way he attacks each note. Every note really seems to get ist own attack. Notice the variations in emphasis as he raises and lowers his hands in his attacks. Notice the power he puts into some of his attacks. These variations in the way he strikes the keys are essential to the variations in sound that he gets out of the piano. His is a unique piano sound.

1’ll leave you with one other thought. I often have also wondered what his reaction was to the fact that many times he was faced with an out-of-tune piano at his record dates. Although I’m sure he would have much preferred an in-tune piano, obviously he was there to create music, so he did. Did this out-of-tuneness affect the way he chose to voice at least some of his music? I’m sure it did, because sound was so important to him. What would he have created on some of today’s fine instruments? Unfortunately, we will never know.

Don Sickler

(contributed by Michael Gerfin)