Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers/Thelonious Monk Quartet, Kilburn Gaumont State, London (GB) - May 7, 1961

Great heroes of bop/modern jazz. Monk piano with Charlie Rouse tenor sax, John Orr double bass and Frankie Dunlop drums. The Jazz Messengers were Lee Morgan trumpet, Wayne Shorter tenor sax, Bobby Timmons piano, Jymie Merritt double bass and Blakey drums. The bohemian figure of Monk crouching over his keyboard, stabbing at individual notes, playing chords with strange intervals, crystalline runs from the treble end of the piano, climbing back up again, his own meandering themes going to unexpected places, echoes of earlier styles like stride. So we heard pieces like Blue Monk, Straight No Chaser, Little Rootie Tootie, ‘Round Midnight. Then came a big contrast: less cerebral, more in-your-face, exciting music from Blakey’s band. Themes and solos. Lee Morgan’s bright trumpet, the understated yet inventive playing of Shorter, Blakey’s superb drumming underpinning everything, generating climaxes, stretching out, indicating changes with a nod of the head or a facial expression. Soulful piano from Timmons. They played pieces like Dis Here, Blues March, Moanin’. Wonderful. Reviewed by Jack Cooke and Ronald Atkins in Jazz Monthly Vol 7, No5, July 1961.