Monk's piano part on Miles Davis' Swing Spring
Charles Chen is currently working on classic piano comping; you may have already seen his collaborations on Bud Powell's and Fats Waller's (amazing job!). He contacted me to work on the tunes Monk recorded as a member of Miles Davis' band.
This is a minimalist tune: the theme is just a F major scale; there is nothing written on the B section; the solos are just Rhythm Changes… But it sounds very cool nonetheless!
I find it kind of difficult to comp on Rhythm Changes, there is much to learn here! Monk has a lot of weird ideas for his comping, like just playing an F, lots of 7th or quartal voicings. He leaves lots of space here and there; sopmetimes it looks like he just plays random chords (B section, bars 90-97). He doesn't comp AT ALL when Miles is soloing…
Monk's solo is perfectly monkish, starting with minor seconds and his "press-release" technique (press two notes, release one finger and let only one note ring). The rest of the solo swings hard, has some virtuoso Monk licks, and so many great ideas!
PDF, 16 pages.
