The first jazz pianist I heard was Thelonious Monk. My father was listening to an album of his called 'Monk's Dream' almost every day from the time I was born.
quote by Benny Green
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Related quotes
Everybody in all countries tries to play jazz.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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I never though much about race.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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I don't know what other people are doing - I just know about me.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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We have two kids, my wife and myself.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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Be-bop wasn't developed in any deliberate way.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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All musicians are subconsciously mathematicians.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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I'd go stupid collecting and counting my money.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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Thelonious Sphere Monk: there's not a more perfect name to fit his compositions than that name.
quote by Matthew Shipp
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His name, even, is part of the marketing scheme, I mean, Thelonious Sphere Monk - how can you think of a better name to fit his style of playing?
quote by Matthew Shipp
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I can shoot pool, and I can play ping-pong. I'm pretty good at those games.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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I went through the whole number, you know. The swing era, the boogie woogie era, the bebop era. Thelonious Monk is still one of my favorites. So a lot of these people had their effect on me.
quote by Mose Allison
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Not Fitting In Despite All Those Years
sometimes you envy
the monk in maroon peacefully
crossing the street
somewhere in Ho Chi Minh
or even an earthen bowl half-filled with water
with a jasmine flower floating
upon a very still world
you like to take the brush and some water colors
to paint all these
but it is a little crowded world you have there
there is simply no time for wasting
it's a fast paced lifestyle
the lifelessness of the to and fro
the unstoppable flow
trying to accomplish almost everything
without meaning.
somewhere in a dream
you wish you were the monk
or even
the jasmine
and then you hit your chest with your fist
convincing yourself that at a certain hour
you can be so foolish
still not fitting in despite all those years
'how can you be a beautiful jasmine in a concrete wall?
how can you be the monk in maroon in a public market full of
swindlers and screaming spice vendors? '
amidst the mess, in the middle of the crowd
how can you be a dream?
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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I guess, you know, if I didn't make it with the piano, I guess I would've been the biggest bum.
quote by Thelonious Monk
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Erasmus
When he protested, not too solemnly,
That for a world’s achieving maintenance
The crust of overdone divinity
Lacked aliment, they called it recreance;
And when he chose through his own glass to scan
Sick Europe, and reduced, unyieldingly,
The monk within the cassock to the man
Within the monk, they called it heresy.
And when he made so perilously bold
As to be scattered forth in black and white,
Good fathers looked askance at him and rolled
Their inward eyes in anguish and affright;
There were some of them did shake at what was told,
And they shook best who knew that he was right.
poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson
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Spank It
1-hey sped!
2-hey what?
1- what you wanna do?
2- I wanna spank!
1-spank what?
2- spank my little monk!!
1-to the left
2- to the right!
1&2- spank it up and down all night!
1- spank the monk!
2- spank, spank the monk!
1- spank the monk!
1&2- spank spank, the monk!
song performed by by Eagles
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The more original something is, the more of a threat it seems until the people catch up with it. That happened with Thelonious Monk. It happened with anybody who is really original.
quote by Steve Lacy
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Great Gambler
The Gambler stopped a monk
dwelling on spiritual plane,
And exclaimed, "Oh! monk
we both are exactly same
So I think we both of us
deserve equal name and fame.
Monk replied, "Gambler! I put
self not a pelf at stake,
And drink bitter poison
for God's sake
Only fool would say our
lives are same
For you a game is life
for me a life is game.''
Dr Hitesh C Sheth
27/12/2009
poem by Hitesh Sheth
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Obsession
Obsession
The pianist Albert has got a job in Loulé last time
I saw him in Faro and fell over a pollard, he said
he was not my father. When he spotted me he ran
into a café, they let him run through the kitchen
into the back, a dead end; I waited for him there.
“If you don´t stop following me I will have to call
the police, I´M NOT YOUR FATHER.” To mollify
him I said: “ I know you are not, but I do admire
your piano playing. ”This pleased him and we had
a drink and he told me he came from Yugoslavia,
had wanted to be a concert pianist, but there was
no money, so he ended up as a café pianist… just
as my father I thought but said nothing… then he
had to leave for work, saw him walk out of my life
just as my father did, there was nothing I could do
to stop this man who refused to be my dad.
poem by Oskar Hansen
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I was born at St. John's, where they lived for a short time.
quote by Maria Monk
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Only Monk Keyed
The monk...
He has the key!
Does that make him,
The only monk keyed who sees?
Inspired by:
Mr. Duncan Wyllie
'Hi Duncan,
Thought I would have some fun with your poem,
'He Sees'.'
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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