Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins

Background

The album is culled from the results of three recording sessionS over a span of close to twelve months featuring different personnel. Although Rollins is credited as a co-leader on the album cover, he appears on only three of the album's five tracks. It was the final Monk release on the label before he moved to a contract with Riverside Records.

The track "Friday the 13th" was recorded in November 1953 with a quintet of Monk, Rollins, Julius Watkins, Percy Heath, and Willie Jones; the September 1954 recordings are of a trio with Monk, Heath, and Art Blakey; and the October 1954 session Monk and Rollins again with bassist Tommy Potter and drummer Art Taylor. Of the three Monk originals, "Friday the 13th" was written in the studio during the recording session, released as a ten-minute jam to fill out the album's running time. Monk would return to "Nutty" again and again through his career, but this was his only recording of the composition "Work."

Three of the recordings on this 12" LP originally appeared in 1954 on 10" LPs: Thelonious Monk Quintet Blows For LP (Prestige PRLP 166),Thelonious Monk Plays (Prestige PRLP 189) and Sonny Rollins and Thelonious Monk Quartet (Prestige PRLP 190).

Track listing

All compositions by Thelonious Monk except where noted.

Side one

1. "The Way You Look Tonight" (Dorothy Fields, Jerome Kern) – 5:13
2. "I Want to Be Happy" (Irving Caesar, Vincent Youmans) – 7:43
3. "Work" – 5:18

Side two

1. "Nutty" – 5:16
2. "Friday the 13th" – 10:32

Personnel