SFJAZZ to Honor Thelonious Monk with Festival

Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk was born on October 10, 1917. This year his son, T.S. Monk, will come to the SFJAZZ Center to celebrate his father’s birthday with a program entitled Monk on Monk. This will be followed by a Thelonious Monk Festival, which will take place over the four days between Thursday, October 12, and Sunday, October 15. The birthday concert will take place in Miner Auditorium, and all of the Festival programs will be performed in the Joe Henderson Lab.

The birthday salute to Thelonious Monk has been an annual event. His son, drummer T.S. Monk, will assemble a ten-piece ensemble to perform a program inspired by the legendary Town Hall concert that his father performed in New York in 1959. He will partner with trumpeter Don Sickler to prepare the arrangements for that ensemble, including “Little Rootie Tootie,” which his father dedicated to him. The Web page for purchasing tickets has already been created; the prices are $25, $35, $45, and $65. For those that do not yet know, the SFJAZZ Center is located at 201 Franklin Street, on the northwest corner of Fell Street.

With two exceptions, tickets for the Festival will be sold for $25. Performance dates and times are as follows, including hyperlinks to their respective event pages:

• Thursday, October 12, 7 p.m. and 8:30 p.m.: Tenor saxophonist Aaron Bennett will lead a trio in performances of the music from Monk’s live 1958 Riverside album Thelonious In Action, recorded at the legendary Five Spot Café. Rhythm will be provided by Dan Seamans on bass and drummer Smith Dobson. The repertoire will include familiar Monk classics such as “Rhythm-A-Ning,” “Epistrophy,” “Blue Monk,” and “Evidence.” The album also included lesser-known works, such as “Light Blue” and “Coming on the Hudson.”
• Friday, October 13, 7:30 p.m.: This will be the first partnership concert in which the SFJAZZ Collective performs with San Francisco Conservatory of Music students in the Roots, Jazz & American Music program. The participating Collective members will be vocalist Carmen Bradford, Matt Brewer on bass, and drummer Matt Wilson. This is the one of the two exceptions for ticket prices. General admission will be $20 with a $10 rate for students. Program details have not yet been announced.
• Saturday, October 14, 8:30 p.m. (tickets for 7 p.m. are sold out): San Francisco pianist Larry Vukovich will lead a trio (members not yet identified) in a program that combines Monk masterpieces with standards from the Great American Songbook.
• Sunday, October 15, 2 p.m.: Guitarist John Schott has prepared a program entitled Round Midnight Reconsidered. He will perform with a cast of adventurous musicians to lead a six-hour exploration of “'Round Midnight.” All tickets will be sold for $15.