Chamber Federation Bringing Bop Pianist

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30541, 9 September 1964, Page 18

Chamber Federation Bringing Bop Pianist

Thelonius Monk, one of the great jazz pianists of the bebop style, is to make a tour of New Zealand under the sponsorship of the New Zealand Federation of Chamber Music Societies early next year.

He will be leading the Thelonius Monk Quartet in 10 concerts arranged by societies belonging to the federation throughout the country. The quartet is the first jazz group invited to New Zealand by the federation, which has sponsored tours by leading chamber music groups and outstanding soloists. Considered one of the outstanding jazz groups of the present time, the Thelonius Monk Quartet was placed first in the small group section of “Downbeat’s,” 1964 critics’ poll. Monk himself was voted second in the piano section of the same poll for the second successive year.

Described as “what many jazzmen have been called and fewer have actually been —an artist,” Monk has been the centre of cultdike adoration by some and the recipient of thought-out knowledgeable praise from others. Forceful Influence Born in North Carolina in 1920, but raised in New York, where he still lives with his wife and two children, this largely self-taught composer and pianist is, along with Dizzy Gillespie and the late Charlie Parker, one of the most forceful influences on contemporary jazz. He began to play the piano when he was six and taught himself to read music long before his first lessons at the age of 11. He was playing in local bands when he was 13. When he was 17 he left New York with a group backing ai swinging female evangelist. I “Sick of hearing musicians

play the same thing the same way all the time,” Monk developed a highly individual style. Because of his unexpected style, and that of his contemporaries, Gillespie, Parker, Charlie Christian and Idrees Sulieman, it was many years before he was accepted by even the basic jazz audiences. He was the focal point of the bebop revolution of the very early 1940 s and has remained a major force ever since, both through his own work and by his influence on others. Automatic Praise Monk finally began winning acceptance in 1957. The recognition gathered momentum and intensity until his records began to receive nearly unanimous and almost automatic praise from the critics, His compositions are now being played by other groups and he has become a major formative influence in jazz.

In addition to the four main centres, the group will visit such places as New Plymouth, Hamilton and Rotorua.