The Unique Sound and Vision of Thelonious Monk

Thelonious Monk had a much wider perspective of racial issues than many of his contemporaries who responded solely to the tension between blacks and whites.  He had no desire to “go through that Black Power shit now,” because he felt that he had already transcended traditional racial politics through his music and his worldview. Instead, Monk’s playing was characterized by unique influences from his diverse community in San Juan Hill.  San Juan Hill was so unique in that its racial tensions were not just between blacks and whites but between many different blacks and many different whites.  There were race issues between the Irish, Italians, and Germans (Kelley 18) as well as between blacks from the South, native black New Yorkers, and immigrants from the Caribbean (Kelley 19).  These more specific distinctions of ethnicity and culture made Monk feel that each block was “another country”.  This complicated Monk’s perspective on race as not so clearly “black” and “white”.  And because it was “mean all over,” it was up to the individual to distinguish himself and create his own community. This community enabled Monk to be the unique individual both in his personal life and in his music.

Monk’s success embodies the phrase “It takes a village to raise a child”.  However, in his case, the word “village” should be replaced by “community,” and  “child” by “genius”.  As  a child in San Juan Hill, Monk had exposure to many different cultures from which he could build his community, or “village”.  He spent most of his time in church and at the Columbus Hill Neighborhood Center (Kelley 28).  These were both places where people could come together in an all-inclusive setting to build extensive networks that served as larger families in the intensity of New York. 

These places provided inspiration for Monk musically as well.  As a child, Monk learned gospel tendencies and sang with his mother in church. Another big influence on his musical development were his piano teachers.  Simon Wolf was a Jewish Austrian immigrant who also lived in San Juan hill and taught him classical piano (Kelley 26).  Simeltaneously, Monk also learned stride piano from another pianist in his community, Alberta Simmons.  In addition to these specific influences, the music being played in the streets and apartment buildings ranging in origin from the Carribean to the South gave Monk an ear for very different styles of music happening at the same time.  This later led to aspects of his distinct, dissonant sound.  It was in this way that the diverse elements and sounds of San Juan Hill effected Monk’s music.

The way that Thelonious Monk opted out of mainstream jazz and instead created his own very unique sound of Bebop is similar to how he ignored typical racial stigmas on the national scale and instead created and reacted to his own communities on the micro scale.  I think that this came from recognizing community at an early age as learning something from those living around you.  Monk’s community shaped him by surrounding him with different musical sounds and the understanding of community as something beyond skin color or a family name.  In turn, Monk’s art fostered a community that was not fragmented by racial tensions but used different cultures to form a multi-faceted ideology and musical sound.