condition (record/cover): NM / NM

Obi and insert included.

Japanese Blue Note collection drawing on the foundational 1947-52 sides - "Criss Cross", "Misterioso", "Epistrophy", the actual birth certificates of modern jazz composition. Thelonious Monk in his late twenties and early thirties, already complete: the whole harmonic language, the rhythmic displacement, the wit, all present from the first Blue Note session onward while most of the jazz world scratched its head. These recordings sold poorly at the time, which remains one of history's better jokes. The title states a plain fact, and the Japanese Blue Note pressings of this material are reliably excellent. Where every Monk story starts.