Thelonious Monk Live in Paris 1967, V. 1

[ghost of miles]

We just received a promo of this, the first official release from the Monk estate. Be forewarned that (1) there are no notes outside of a brief Q and A with T.S. Monk on the inner sleeve (2) "Epistrophy," a 9:45 performance, is badly truncated and runs about a minute and a half (3) it's a CD-R.  Hopefully volume 2 comes out better.  I'm sure some board members have previous unofficial versions of this concert.. might wanna keep 'em for the time being.

[Ken Dryden]

I was sent the LP version of this release. 

I've owned this CD for decades:

"Epistrophy" may have been edited prior to its original broadcast.

[Peter Friedman]

I also have that same CD referred to above by Ken.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

1 hour ago, ghost of miles said:

We just received a promo of this, the first official release from the Monk estate. Be forewarned that (1) there are no notes outside of a brief Q and A with T.S. Monk on the inner sleeve (2) "Epistrophy," a 9:45 performance, is badly truncated and runs about a minute and a half (3) it's a CD-R.  Hopefully volume 2 comes out better.  I'm sure some board members have previous unofficial versions of this concert.. might wanna keep 'em for the time being.

"First official release from the Monk estate"? What about:

Released by the Monk estate in 2002?

https://www.discogs.com/release/7786257-Thelonious-Live-In-Paris-Vol-3

[romualdo]

This was actually released (7 tracks) here in Australia back in 1993 - only missing the intro

[Dub Modal]

Well this has confused me. 

I have that Esoldun release shown above as well. From 1988! May as well give it a listen. I won't be buying a CD-R

[bertrand]

8 hours ago, ghost of miles said:

We just received a promo of this, the first official release from the Monk estate. Be forewarned that (1) there are no notes outside of a brief Q and A with T.S. Monk on the inner sleeve (2) "Epistrophy," a 9:45 performance, is badly truncated and runs about a minute and a half (3) it's a CD-R.  Hopefully volume 2 comes out better.  I'm sure some board members have previous unofficial versions of this concert.. might wanna keep 'em for the time being.

CD-R? For shame. That is not showing respect for Monk.

[JSngry]

It's just a promo

 

 

[ghost of miles]

17 hours ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

"First official release from the Monk estate"? What about:

Released by the Monk estate in 2002?

https://www.discogs.com/release/7786257-Thelonious-Live-In-Paris-Vol-3

I was going by what the note on the inner sleeve says. So apparently that's not accurate either?

 

18 hours ago, Ken Dryden said:

I was sent the LP version of this release. 

I've owned this CD for decades:

"Epistrophy" may have been edited prior to its original broadcast.

Not sure what happened with this new release, but it's clearly not right--track two starts in mid-performance and only runs for about 1:30 or so, though the listing on the CD gives the same running time as the one you've posted. 

[Lazaro Vega]

That Epistrophy sounds like a sign off, and it goes out! 

Is this the concert Monk was so mad about in the documentary? Where he knocks that Styrofoam cup off the table in the dressing room after it was over?

[mikeweil]

Epistrophy was Monk's closing theme.

[Tony Stodart]

Hi. I also have the French CD that Ken Dryden noted earlier. Excited ALWAYS to hear quality Monk music I was disappointed that no CD version was offered. I sent the estate an email asking if a CD or FLAC files would be offered as a paid download but didn’t get an answer. I read a Jazzwise review that noted the tracks are out of order! The tracks have only recently been put on Spotify and other streaming platforms. So, after I read the Jazzwise review I listened to the new version. I initially thought the new release just put tracks on that fit the vinyl format and that Epistrophy track 1 is actually the final track of the concert as a sign off that Monk often did - also noted earlier by mikeweil. So, better sound quality is GREAT! But why split the concert out of order? I looked a bit more and the vinyl release still has the wrong track order but Epistrophy is the long version and is track 1 after the intro, so that’s good - I have no idea why the Spotify and YouTube etc versions have the last track as the first. Crazy!! Also the back of the vinyl does say a CD version will be released - so fingers crossed! Many Monk albums enjoyed (and improved) unedited and complete performances on CD - The Town Hall Concert, The Big Band at Lincoln Centre etc. so I don’t know why this is not available in CD format yet. The last track on the Town Hall extended version (Keepnews issue) is my favourite version of Rhythm-a-ning with Charlie Rouse and Thelonious chasing each other. It’s AMAZING! Maybe the CD version of this 1967 concert will come with Volume 2. I’m sure if Thelonious was here today he would not be happy with this “new” out of order version. Anyway, more Monk is always good. Just seems odd and a bit disrespectful the way this is being done. 

[GA Russell]

Volume 2 available October 9.

The Thelonious Monk Estate Presents Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume Two Available October 9 via Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment   Following Volume One, the Estate's First Official Issue of These 1967 Paris Recordings, Volume Two Brings the Full Nine-Piece Ensemble to "Blue Monk" and "Epistrophy Theme"   The 15-Minute "Oska-T" Fills Side B as Volume Two Documents Monk's 1967 European Touring With an Expanded Ensemble   The Thelonious Monk Estate is proud to announce Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume Two, out October 9, 2026 via Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment. The second installment features Thelonious Monk, one of the defining composers and pianists of modern jazz, with his longstanding quartet of Charlie Rouse on tenor saxophone, Larry Gales on bass and Ben Riley on drums, joined by trumpeters Clark Terry and Ray Copeland, alto saxophonist Phil Woods, tenor saxophonist Johnny Griffin and trombonist Jimmy Cleveland. Terry plays on “Blue Monk” and “Epistrophy Theme”; Copeland, Woods, Griffin, Rouse, Cleveland, Monk, Gales and Riley play on all three musical selections.   Released April 24, 2026 on 180-gram vinyl and digital platforms, Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume One marked the first official Estate issue of recordings from the concert after unauthorized editions had circulated for years. It presented Monk’s quartet alongside Copeland, Woods, Griffin and Cleveland in changing combinations and announced that the complete nine-piece group, including Terry, would come together on Volume Two. DownBeat awarded the first installment four and a half stars and called it “revelatory unburied treasure,” while All About Jazz described it as a “beautifully recorded” addition to Monk’s musical story.   After the artist introduction, all nine musicians play “Blue Monk” and “Epistrophy Theme.” The 15:10 “Oska-T” fills Side B with Copeland, Woods, Griffin, Rouse and Cleveland joining Monk, Gales and Riley. T.S. Monk describes his father’s compositions as “living frameworks, not fixed objects,” with melody, harmony and space changing from one performance to the next. He describes Monk onstage in terms of “humor, daring, patience, and deep sense of swing,” and says the same tune could sound completely different from night to night.   T.S., who performed in his father’s band as a drummer, remembers Monk giving musicians considerable freedom over when they joined a performance. He might ask someone, “You feel like playing? I want you to play,” or tell him to “pick your spot.” The ensemble expands and contracts throughout the Paris concert, with musicians appearing in different configurations. T.S. also recalls that “when it came to the rhythm, Monk set the rhythm.” For T.S. as a drummer, simply keeping time was not enough: he had to listen closely, converse within the rhythm section and respond to the soloist.   T.S. says the Estate chose the Paris recordings in part to showcase the caliber of musicians who toured Europe with Monk. The engagement was part of George Wein’s Newport Jazz Festival touring operation, and Copeland, Terry, Woods and Griffin all had previous musical associations with Monk. T.S. notes that Monk’s quartet and his work with Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Art Blakey and Max Roach are well known, while his European touring with larger ensembles is less familiar. Griffin and Rouse represented successive periods of Monk’s quartet: Griffin preceded Rouse, who became Monk’s longtime tenor saxophonist. Both appeared with Monk elsewhere on the same tour, including Stockholm, Rotterdam, Berlin and Mainz.   The three compositions date from different periods of Monk’s career. Co-written with drummer Kenny Clarke, “Epistrophy” went by several early titles, including “The Theme,” reflecting its use by the Minton’s Playhouse house band to open and close sets. “Blue Monk,” first recorded in 1954, became one of the pieces Monk returned to most often. Monk first recorded “Oska-T” in 1963. T.S. remembers watching his father work on the tune for “weeks and weeks” at Pannonica de Koenigswarter’s home even though, to his young ears, it consisted of “just these little phrases.” The Paris performance runs 15:10 and occupies the entire second side.   The Estate began trying to recover circulating Monk recordings in the late 1980s and 1990s, contacting private collectors and bootleg communities and asking them to return the music to Monk’s family. Recordings gradually came back through that effort. T.S. already knew Rudy Van Gelder from making two of his own albums with him, and Van Gelder digitally remastered the Paris concert in 2002. The family intended to release the recordings then, but T.S. says manufacturing, distribution, advertising and public relations required capital and infrastructure the Estate did not have at the time.   More than two decades after Van Gelder remastered the recordings, the Estate returned to the project in a vastly different independent music landscape. Digital distribution and direct communication with listeners had made an independent Estate-led release more practical. Monk’s grandchildren had also joined T.S. and the rest of the family in the archive’s creative, editorial, production and marketing work, creating what T.S. calls “three generations of stewardship.” The Estate prepared the recordings for this authorized release and commissioned new liner notes to provide historical context, all with the family’s direct authorization and participation.   T.S. calls the process “bootlegging the bootleggers” — reclaiming recordings that had circulated outside the family’s control and issuing them with the family’s authorization. He points listeners in particular to what Monk plays behind Rouse, Griffin, Terry, Woods and Copeland: his harmonic choices, rhythmic ideas, use of space and responses to the soloists. T.S. connects those elements to Monk’s wider influence on modern jazz. “These releases allow people to hear that influence happening in real time, on the bandstand,” he says, “rather than simply being told about it after the fact.”   Tracklisting Artist Introduction — 2:00 Blue Monk — 5:10 Epistrophy Theme — 1:20 Oska-T — 15:10   Personnel Thelonious Monk — piano Clark Terry — trumpet (“Blue Monk,” “Epistrophy Theme”) Ray Copeland — trumpet Phil Woods — alto saxophone Johnny Griffin — tenor saxophone Charlie Rouse — tenor saxophone Jimmy Cleveland — trombone Larry Gales — bass Ben Riley — drums   Digital remastering by Rudy Van Gelder at Van Gelder Recording Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, in 2002. Originally produced by Thelonious Monk Productions, Incorporated for Thelonious Records, Incorporated. Thelonious Monk · Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume Two Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment · Release Date: October 9, 2026   Thelonious Monk · Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume One Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment · Release Date: April 24, 2026   For more information on Thelonious Monk, please visit: theloniousmonk.store | Instagram     For the Preferred Artist # # #

[Kevin Bresnahan]

1 hour ago, GA Russell said:

Volume 2 available October 9.

The Thelonious Monk Estate Presents Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume Two Available October 9 via Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment   Following Volume One, the Estate's First Official Issue of These 1967 Paris Recordings, Volume Two Brings the Full Nine-Piece Ensemble to "Blue Monk" and "Epistrophy Theme"   The 15-Minute "Oska-T" Fills Side B as Volume Two Documents Monk's 1967 European Touring With an Expanded Ensemble   The Thelonious Monk Estate is proud to announce Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume Two, out October 9, 2026 via Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment. The second installment features Thelonious Monk, one of the defining composers and pianists of modern jazz, with his longstanding quartet of Charlie Rouse on tenor saxophone, Larry Gales on bass and Ben Riley on drums, joined by trumpeters Clark Terry and Ray Copeland, alto saxophonist Phil Woods, tenor saxophonist Johnny Griffin and trombonist Jimmy Cleveland. Terry plays on “Blue Monk” and “Epistrophy Theme”; Copeland, Woods, Griffin, Rouse, Cleveland, Monk, Gales and Riley play on all three musical selections.   Released April 24, 2026 on 180-gram vinyl and digital platforms, Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume One marked the first official Estate issue of recordings from the concert after unauthorized editions had circulated for years. It presented Monk’s quartet alongside Copeland, Woods, Griffin and Cleveland in changing combinations and announced that the complete nine-piece group, including Terry, would come together on Volume Two. DownBeat awarded the first installment four and a half stars and called it “revelatory unburied treasure,” while All About Jazz described it as a “beautifully recorded” addition to Monk’s musical story.   After the artist introduction, all nine musicians play “Blue Monk” and “Epistrophy Theme.” The 15:10 “Oska-T” fills Side B with Copeland, Woods, Griffin, Rouse and Cleveland joining Monk, Gales and Riley. T.S. Monk describes his father’s compositions as “living frameworks, not fixed objects,” with melody, harmony and space changing from one performance to the next. He describes Monk onstage in terms of “humor, daring, patience, and deep sense of swing,” and says the same tune could sound completely different from night to night.   T.S., who performed in his father’s band as a drummer, remembers Monk giving musicians considerable freedom over when they joined a performance. He might ask someone, “You feel like playing? I want you to play,” or tell him to “pick your spot.” The ensemble expands and contracts throughout the Paris concert, with musicians appearing in different configurations. T.S. also recalls that “when it came to the rhythm, Monk set the rhythm.” For T.S. as a drummer, simply keeping time was not enough: he had to listen closely, converse within the rhythm section and respond to the soloist.   T.S. says the Estate chose the Paris recordings in part to showcase the caliber of musicians who toured Europe with Monk. The engagement was part of George Wein’s Newport Jazz Festival touring operation, and Copeland, Terry, Woods and Griffin all had previous musical associations with Monk. T.S. notes that Monk’s quartet and his work with Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Art Blakey and Max Roach are well known, while his European touring with larger ensembles is less familiar. Griffin and Rouse represented successive periods of Monk’s quartet: Griffin preceded Rouse, who became Monk’s longtime tenor saxophonist. Both appeared with Monk elsewhere on the same tour, including Stockholm, Rotterdam, Berlin and Mainz.   The three compositions date from different periods of Monk’s career. Co-written with drummer Kenny Clarke, “Epistrophy” went by several early titles, including “The Theme,” reflecting its use by the Minton’s Playhouse house band to open and close sets. “Blue Monk,” first recorded in 1954, became one of the pieces Monk returned to most often. Monk first recorded “Oska-T” in 1963. T.S. remembers watching his father work on the tune for “weeks and weeks” at Pannonica de Koenigswarter’s home even though, to his young ears, it consisted of “just these little phrases.” The Paris performance runs 15:10 and occupies the entire second side.   The Estate began trying to recover circulating Monk recordings in the late 1980s and 1990s, contacting private collectors and bootleg communities and asking them to return the music to Monk’s family. Recordings gradually came back through that effort. T.S. already knew Rudy Van Gelder from making two of his own albums with him, and Van Gelder digitally remastered the Paris concert in 2002. The family intended to release the recordings then, but T.S. says manufacturing, distribution, advertising and public relations required capital and infrastructure the Estate did not have at the time.   More than two decades after Van Gelder remastered the recordings, the Estate returned to the project in a vastly different independent music landscape. Digital distribution and direct communication with listeners had made an independent Estate-led release more practical. Monk’s grandchildren had also joined T.S. and the rest of the family in the archive’s creative, editorial, production and marketing work, creating what T.S. calls “three generations of stewardship.” The Estate prepared the recordings for this authorized release and commissioned new liner notes to provide historical context, all with the family’s direct authorization and participation.   T.S. calls the process “bootlegging the bootleggers” — reclaiming recordings that had circulated outside the family’s control and issuing them with the family’s authorization. He points listeners in particular to what Monk plays behind Rouse, Griffin, Terry, Woods and Copeland: his harmonic choices, rhythmic ideas, use of space and responses to the soloists. T.S. connects those elements to Monk’s wider influence on modern jazz. “These releases allow people to hear that influence happening in real time, on the bandstand,” he says, “rather than simply being told about it after the fact.”   Tracklisting Artist Introduction — 2:00 Blue Monk — 5:10 Epistrophy Theme — 1:20 Oska-T — 15:10   Personnel Thelonious Monk — piano Clark Terry — trumpet (“Blue Monk,” “Epistrophy Theme”) Ray Copeland — trumpet Phil Woods — alto saxophone Johnny Griffin — tenor saxophone Charlie Rouse — tenor saxophone Jimmy Cleveland — trombone Larry Gales — bass Ben Riley — drums   Digital remastering by Rudy Van Gelder at Van Gelder Recording Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, in 2002. Originally produced by Thelonious Monk Productions, Incorporated for Thelonious Records, Incorporated. Thelonious Monk · Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume Two Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment · Release Date: October 9, 2026   Thelonious Monk · Monk Live In Paris, 1967. Volume One Rhythm-A-Ning Entertainment · Release Date: April 24, 2026   For more information on Thelonious Monk, please visit: theloniousmonk.store | Instagram     For the Preferred Artist # # #

Is TS Monk losing it?? These WERE released in 2002 albeit through the estate's website. Just because they didn't get released commercially, they were still "officially released" by HIM. I have it. A lot of us probably do too.

[felser]

1964 vs. 1967.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

2 hours ago, felser said:

1964 vs. 1967.

I pasted the  wrong artwork. The 1967 material was released as Vol. 3. Also released by the Monk estate in 2002.

[Patrick]

I’m not too skilled at retrieving old threads. Could someone please get a link to the (now ancient?) discussion of “Thelonious Records”? I remember that there were/are a number of titles. Of these, I own only “Monk in Paris: Live at the Olympia” (from 1965). Thanks

[John L]

1 hour ago, Patrick said:

I’m not too skilled at retrieving old threads. Could someone please get a link to the (now ancient?) discussion of “Thelonious Records”? I remember that there were/are a number of titles. Of these, I own only “Monk in Paris: Live at the Olympia” (from 1965). Thanks

I think that this list on this discogs page is pretty complete.   I don't recall any others.  (The Steve Lacy and Dave Wilson listings are obvious errors)

https://www.discogs.com/label/115699-Thelonious-Records

Edited August 31 by John L

[Patrick]

Thanks.