Misterioso - A Journey into the Silence of Thelonious Monk

Synopsis

A journey into the silence of Thelonius Monk, fusing jazz with the words of Italian writer Stefano Benni. The story explores the magic of jazz through the life of legendary pianist Thelonious Monk, a genius and an outsider, who spent the last seven years of his life in complete silence. His music is widely used in the show.

Our Review:

26 October 2009

A man with perhaps the best name in the history of music, the life of Thelonious Sphere Monk seems well suited to dramatisation. Monk is widely acknowledged to be one of the twentieth century’s most original musical innovators and his unique compositional and piano performance style have had an enormous influence on contemporary music. Always enigmatic, he spent the last seven years of his life in almost complete silence, locked away from the world under the care of his close friend Baroness Pannonica Rothschild, better known as the ‘Jazz Baroness’.

In Misterioso, writer Stefano Benni and adaptor/director Filomena Campus have sought to shed some light on this unusual relationship and to explore the paradoxical silence that defined this great musician’s last years.

Central to this exploration is a quartet of musicians drawn from the top ranks of London’s jazz and free improv scene. With a changing roster of guests ea...

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