Misterioso: Thelonious Monk

Misterioso was recorded live in 1958 by Riverside Records, featuring the Thelonious Monk Quartet with Johnny Griffin on tenor saxophone instead of John Coltrane, who at that point in his career decided to go solo and at times work with Miles Davis. The others of the quartet include Ahmed Abdul-Malik on bass, Roy Haynes on drums, and Thelonious Monk himself on the piano. This album is one of Monk’s interesting ones, not only losing one familiar partners but two; the first being John Coltrane and the other being drummer Shadow Wilson, who Monk lost due to poor health. Griffin and Coltrane both had a familiar understanding of how Thelonious Monk enjoyed performing, finding it difficult to stray away from Monk’s original ideas and “one note off” could change the entire piece.

In “Nutty,” Griffin can be commonly found reusing the melody to avoid straying away from any mistakes, diminishing the chorus and using it to repeat after Monk who is accompanying him. From there, he ascends and descends into a flurry of scales, playing a sequence down using a fourth before applying it into a series of arpeggios. When his phrases contain less scales, Griffin takes the time to harmonize with Monk, matching his volume at the start of his phrases and elongating the melody, amplifying his sound toward the ends to have them recognizable as his own work. Also, he

rarely holds out any straight notes in his solo, maintaining a swift feel by trilling, bending, and adding ornaments to notes to avoid even so much as a thought for a tempo change before Monk presents his own ideas.
Monk starts with the melody to remind listeners what the original refrain is, also to change the feel of the piece compared to Griffin’s work. He adds clusters into the original chords if the melody and changes the rhythm a bit to make it his own for a unique sound. There are a few sections in his solo where he harmonizes with the melody using a single note, worrying less about mistakes, if they could be considered mistakes at all, and cares more about the impact of the solo. During the rests of the melody, Thelonious Monk takes the time to play descending scales quickly before blocking the chords so the melody can still be heard at the appropriate times. His solo gets meatier when he eases into his solo, swinging his eighths and maintaining the melody while using the mid-range of the piano to apply denser-sounding chords. The solo ends with the chords of the melody, played without any alterations, which could have also been a sign for the rest of the band to start the chorus again.
Griffin’s sound in “Blues Five Spot” has a bit more push to it, growling every so often and consistently presenting a raspier tone. At the start of his solo, he chromatically ascends on the scale to create a motif, frequently returning to it after arpeggiating downward several times. After he plays through the quicker section of his solo, he alters his rhythms from several sixteenth notes to a swung eighth-note feel for the next phrase, only to add more musical differences in time before playing a flurry of notes that make up the appropriate scale. Although he plays through several scales, he takes time to articulate the notes of the current chord being presented in the solo. Another important moment of articulation in Griffin’s solo is when he creates a rhythmic pattern using one pitch and accents specific beats to intrigue listeners. Thelonious Monk’s voice can be heard to cue the others to cut off the others, letting Griffin play however he wants to up to the end of his solo. Before Haynes’ makes a comeback to bring in Monk’s upcoming solo, Griffin toys around with several melodies, borrowing from even the catchy tune of “The Sailor’s Hornpipe.”
Monk starts off his solo with the melody, altering it slightly at each chord change, first with pitch, then rhythm. He continues to use the melody of the refrain for another phrase before playing a series of scales and arpeggios, stopping at notes which refer to the melody to maintain the idea. He also creates dissonance right away with his chord choices while playing the melody. Thelonious Monk plays with a carefree personality, allowing notes to play and resonate even if they are not part of the current chord. There is a section where he uses a pentatonic scale as a phrase in his solo, which helps adds onto his unique rhythmic ideas. Midway through, Monk plays a series of minor sixths to create a melody, never straying from the interval regardless of the chance of being dissonant to the chord. He amplifies his sound as he reaches the end of his solo, immediately bringing his sound down to a mezzopiano/piano for Malik to begin his solo.
The walking bass is prominent in Malik’s solo at first, who raises his volume a bit more to start creating a melody using swung eighths. His solo is short as well, so Malik uses the time wisely to not only introduce his instrument, but to show off how he has mastered the upright bass. Malik does not stray from applying the bassline somehow in his solo, articulating the appropriate notes which not only match the phrase but follow the current chord at the time. He takes advantage of his solo time by playing a series of arpeggios and different intervals, avoiding scales as much as possible. He simplifies the idea of his solo at its end to give Haynes enough room to begin his own solo.
Roy Haynes strays away from using cymbals in his solo, primarily playing a series of difficult rhythms on what sounds like toms on his drum set. He repeats patterns and keeps his solo interesting by accenting upbeats, using different rhythmic patterns such as a series of quarter note triplets into eighth note triplets, and so on. The short section featuring cymbals is a repeated phrase he uses prior in his solo, and becomes a frequent pattern immediately afterward. Also, because of it being a drum solo, the others in the quartet drop out for Haynes to artistically express himself in any way he would like, so long as he can return to the refrain, which he easily does when reintroducing the remaining three of the Thelonious Monk quartet.
In “Let’s Cool One,” Griffin plays a series of ornaments as a descending sequence at the beginning of his solo, using the full extent of the tenor saxophone’s range both upward and downward. Ornaments beginning on the melody’s starting pitch also seem to be a consistent pattern in his solo, using them before playing his series of scales and arpeggios. Griffin primarily uses sixteenth notes in his solo, and leaning more toward the higher and mid ranges of the tenor sax. When playing with pitches in the higher octaves, he has the tendency to bend more notes than those of lower ranges. Confident with using the refrain’s melody, Griffin borrows from it several times later on, especially when the other three of the quartet leave him to perform alone.
Monk begins his solo with the refrain’s melody, straying away from it toward the ends of his phrases. After using the melody a few more times, ending each phrase with a descending scale, he then plays a quarter note triplet rhythm using one pitch to create a new idea of where his melody may begin within the solo. After primarily using the note as the returning sound, Thelonious Monk plays a series of arpeggios where the ending notes of each chord is part of the refrain’s melody. By doing this, however, he makes it easier to return to the idea of scales and arpeggios within his solo. He uses the melody again an octave higher than originally played, with additional chords underneath to enhance the sound’s body. Monk somehow finds a way to add clusters of sound into his solo, ending his own with the refrain’s melody in octaves played by both hands. By articulating as heavily as possible, Monk also strays off and hits extra notes, creating the sound he not only wants from the exact pitches, but also of the clusters surrounding the “written” notes.
Monk begins playing the melody of “In Walked Bud,” having Griffin follow him after playing it through once. The rhythm section becomes more prominent by the third repeat and bridge of the refrain, offering a more audible bass line and drum beat.
This allows Griffin to introduce his solo more easily, playing arpeggios and scales, but also making patterns and rhythms using either a single pitch, minor thirds, or perfect fourths. There are little lengthened rests in his solo, using all of his allotted time to play something interesting in front of his current rhythm section. With that, he repeats his phrases often, altering them slightly to keep them interesting as he continues to play throughout. There is also a section where instead of articulating each note, he plays an ascending scale using a legato sound, which contrasts greatly against his heavily articulated arpeggios and scales throughout. This is also the longest of Griffin’s solos on the six track album, using anything and everything without struggle and successfully easing up for Monk to play.
It is interesting to hear Thelonious Monk uses the melody of the refrain but almost in “short form,” diminishing sections and augmenting others so it can still be heard, but can also sound like a new idea. Along with his swung eighths which lead into descending scales, Monk uses the first three notes in what sounds like a minor scale as a motif and a returning point for his solo, expanding from it and adding clusters as his solo progresses. He also plays it an octave higher and diverges from there using faster, sloppier sixteenth note descending scales. What Monk also does is end his solo is repeat the entire melody but an octave to retain the solo feel but also fully ending his own performance for Ahmed Abdul-Malik.
Malik’s solo at first sounds like a walking bass line, but with Haynes playing as little as possible to only maintain the tempo, it is easier for the bassist to play a melody of his own. He maintains a straight quarter-note feel in the upbeat speed of “In Walked Bud,” straying away to replace a quarter note with two eighth notes (along with other similar patterns), but not enough to change the feel of his solo. Malik also uses the time to play the Oriental Riff midway through, changing the consistent pattern of his solo with a few more breaks in between. With Haynes no longer playing behind him, Malik changes the tempo to something a bit more agreeable with what he was interested in using in the solo to begin with, jumping between octaves and using rhythms and phrases from the other two soloists before him.
The swung feel is brought back with Haynes’ rhythmic pattern at the beginning of his solo, where one section sounds as if it were just on the upbeat. He uses the rhythm consistently in his solo at first and continues to add onto it, including more upbeats, a series of straight notes on what sounds like the snare, and moving the pattern around altogether to create what could be considered a drum sequence. Haynes also takes advantage of his multiple toms to change the pitches of his rhythm slightly, using the snare later on to change the quality of sound. As his solo continues, he begins to use more of the drum set, speeding up as he continues to build into his sound for the others to play the refrain with him one last time.
Thelonious Monk performs in “Just a Gigolo” alone, at first playing the refrain by himself before moving up an octave and uses the range to play descending scales between the melodic phrases.

During his minor improve section, Monk changes the sound into more of a ballad, adding suspensions and elongating his phrases. The swung eighth note melody changes at times to almost a triplet feel for listeners to dance to. At the end, as Monk plays the ending chords, he still gives enough time for himself to play an ascending scale, also taking into account that he is his own accompanist in this piece, before fading off into

silence.
In the final piece of the album, Griffin is the only featured soloist, and instead of taking similar risks like in other recordings, he decides to maintain the mellow sound “Misterioso” has to offer. Knowing this is one of Monk’s albums that he himself considers almost a life story, Griffin does his best to maintain the character, borrowing from a number of Monk’s other solos to continuously remind listeners of who the song is about. Griffin also avoids using as much scales and arpeggios as he normally would with a tenor sax solo, and instead creates a series of melodies in short phrases to also have the rhythm section heard. He also lingers around the midrange of the instrument, borrowing from the licks Monk uses while accompanying him to almost echo the ideas. By doing this, both Monk and Griffin are playing off each other, borrowing from one another almost instantaneously to maintain the sound from beginning to the faded end of the album.