tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6130830332820181818.post1172455809192073619..comments2024-03-27T13:13:25.164-04:00Comments on johnshaplin: 'Melodius Thunk' in the News by Robin D.G. Kelleyjohnshaplinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17618981988062495637noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6130830332820181818.post-38524259431245828972010-01-29T07:35:31.101-05:002010-01-29T07:35:31.101-05:00The Life and Times of Thelonious Monk by Robin D.G...The Life and Times of Thelonious Monk by Robin D.G. Kelley, Free Press, 2009johnshaplinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17618981988062495637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6130830332820181818.post-62415599321670223642010-01-29T07:28:41.687-05:002010-01-29T07:28:41.687-05:00It now seems likely that I first became aware of M...It now seems likely that I first became aware of Monk through this "Time" magazine article, I think my parents discontinued their prescription to the "Saturday Evening Post" when we moved to St.Louis from Boston that year. I remember forming my opposition to the war in Vietnam by reading reports in "Time" in subsequent years. I was sixteen in 1964 but already politically engaged as a friend and I had campaigned for the election of John F. Kennedy by printing business-type cards ('Vote Kennedy') and sticking them under wind-shield wipers on our way home from school. I also heard Martin Luther King Jr. speak at a fund-raiser for the S.C.L.C. at our local church in St.Louis around this time. I was, however, unaware of the various critical responses generated by the "Time" article. My father was testifying as an educational expert for the N.A.A.C.P in school desegregation cases but my parents but were "white liberals uncomfortable with rising black militancy". Neither were fans of jazz.johnshaplinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17618981988062495637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6130830332820181818.post-69095259790458182972010-01-29T07:26:11.307-05:002010-01-29T07:26:11.307-05:00*For an emerging avant-garde experimenting in conc...*For an emerging avant-garde experimenting in conceptual and performance art, Monk's spontaneous dance, combined with his drinking during and between sets, embodied the perfect expression of pleasure and excess. Dance historian Sally Banes traces what she calls the rise of avant-garde performance and the "effervescent body" to Greenwich Village in 1963. I suspect Monk's own "effervescent body" spinning and lurching at the Five Spot contributed to the downtown artists' search for bodily freedom. The club's culture and reputation contributed as well, for at the Five Spot performance could just as easily erupt from the audience as on stage. For example, one night Monk was so late getting t the gig that a young man in the audience got up on stage, "whipped out a cordless electric razor and gave himself a full barbering."...For Monk dancing and spinning about on the stage, and his inimical piano playing style, was just not because he was feeling good and digging the music. It was a matter of stagecraft, and as he got older he understood that spectacle sells and eccentricity makes good copy. His stage antics went over well in most parts of Europe, Canada and especially Japan.johnshaplinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17618981988062495637noreply@blogger.com