SwingDJs

anyone else dig thelonious monk?
his ellington album is a good way in, but really all his stuff that i've heard is straightup awesome. i think "monk's music" is supposed to be the best. also look for "art blakey and thelonious monk"

Other than Straight No Chaser, I've had a hard time finding danceable Monk. It's probably just me. But suggestions are always welcome.

it's definitely not for dancing, this is the "other music" forum! some of the ellington stuff is "almost" danceable but i wouldn't play it except to be experimental at an exchange. it's really best for listening.

Well this is under "other music" and I don't expect much danceable music from Monk. Kinda like I don't expect much from Miles either. Anyways, I like Thelonius Monk as much as I dislike him. The feeling and vibe he creates rock me sometimes, but then his technique gets in the way of everything other times. Quite a character, though, on stage or off.

Try Genius Of Modern Music Vol 2, some of it swings.

is he still alive?

Monk died in 82 after a period of reclusiveness where he did not play piano at all.

I've always wondered how "Well, You Needn't" would go over at a dance. Other than the somewhat askew melody the rhythm isn't that much different from a traditional swing number, from what I can remember.

Watching him do Blue Monk in Jazz on a Summer's Day - damn.



seriously - damn.

Yakov wrote:it's definitely not for dancing, this is the "other music" forum! some of the ellington stuff is "almost" danceable but i wouldn't play it except to be experimental at an exchange. it's really best for listening.

I don't consider the "other music" forum to mean "music for listening" or "non-danceable music" but instead to mean "Lindy Hop music beyond the common stuff you hear at Lindy events." It is still relevant to the overall subject of being a "Swing DJ." In other words, it is a forum to push the boundaries of what we consider LindyHoppable music, not a forum to discuss any old music to which we listen.

As for Monk, several years ago, I tried Monk at times when inclined to "push the limits" and expand what we dance to. The jump from Benny Goodman to Oscar Peterson's"Night Train" material was more of a stretch than from Oscar Peterson to Monk. Same thing with some Sonny Rollins, Miles Davis, and even Coltrane (other boppish Jazz legends that are oddly ignored by Lindy Hoppers), all of which do have songs with steady swing rhythms, even if the accented emphasis is not what we are accustomed to.

However, it has not caught on like I hoped it would.

My tactic was to play softer-rhythmed Oscar Peterson, Sonny Clark, or Betty Roche material with which they are familiar just before it so as to soften the beat that they expect to hear. Sometimes the vibe would get lost before I got to Monk or Davis, and I would reel it back in

The other stumbling block is that the solos go on forever, and even the most ardent jazz-oriented Lindy Hopper doesn't generally endure 10 minute songs. I have edited "So What?" down with fade-outs and fade-ins (one version with just Miles' solo, another with just Coltrane's solo), but it still is tough because the edited versions do not have the natural beginning, middle, and end of the orignial tune.

Swinging Music
Everything about the swinging music we love to DJ

Other Music
Other music that might interest us


Maybe it's just me, but "Other Music" seems to imply the negative of "Swinging music we love to DJ". Which is about as far from "lindy hop music" as I can imagine. Why would you play a song that doesn't swing for lindy hop?

Don't imagine you have a lock on anal retentiveness around here.

While bop "swings" is it Swing?

I seem to recall Frankie complaining that you couldn't lindy hop to bop. A bop rhythm section is vastly different from a swing rhythm section. Any biography of Buddy Rich or Gene Krupa will instantly tell you why.

"Kind of Blue", by the way, is not considered bop by jazz critics. It was called "modal jazz" because it didn't use bop idioms at all (such as the trademark be-bop ending to melodic lines). In fact Miles consciously tried to discard the conventions of then-current jazz songwriting by using modes instead of tremendous numbers of complicated chords.

julius wrote:While bop "swings" is it Swing?

Yes and no. As a term of art of a sub-genre of Jazz (e.g. "The Swing Era"), bop is not "swing." However, as indicated in your question, bop does use swing rhythm (syncopated triplets, equal emphasis on each beat in 4/4 time instead of, say, every other beat common to pre-swing Jazz), and thus some bop songs can be appropriate for swing dancing.

I seem to recall Frankie complaining that you couldn't lindy hop to bop. A bop rhythm section is vastly different from a swing rhythm section.

Frankie has a broad interpretation of what is Lindyable, but he experienced bop first-hand as a movement dedicated to eradicating the notion that Jazz was dance music and trying to elevate Jazz above its pop-drivel perception at the time. I would interpret what he said as an outcropping of that dischord, not a categorical statement that no bop is LindyHoppable.

"Kind of Blue", by the way, is not considered bop by jazz critics. It was called "modal jazz" because it didn't use bop idioms at all (such as the trademark be-bop ending to melodic lines). In fact Miles consciously tried to discard the conventions of then-current jazz songwriting by using modes instead of tremendous numbers of complicated chords.

Yes, I was using the term "bop" rather broadly to refer to non-swing jazz so as to avoid needing to use different terms when describing non-swing Jazzmen like Monk, Rollins, Davis, and Coltrane. All of them have bop influences, though, which is why I loosely used "bop." I've also referred to Davis as "Cool Jazz," but that term seems to be falling out of vogue because it does not sound "academic" enough and probably reminds people of "smooth jazz" a bit too much.

Why isn't bop suitable for lindy hop? Because the rhythm section isn't playing together, they're playing off each other. The underlying pulse is buried in counter-rhythms and accents. Besides, how would you be "musical" (as modern lindy hoppers call it) to bop?

Swing is about the rhythm that, as Basie put it, makes you want to pat your foot.

Bop is about the rhythm, as Eddie Condon put it, that made you want to flat your fifth, not drink it.

Lawrence wrote:In other words, it is a forum to push the boundaries of what we consider LindyHoppable music, not a forum to discuss any old music to which we listen.

says you.