Thelonious Monk

2 LP SET!

Monk’s Dream was the first album Thelonious Monk released on Columbia Records after his less than amicable departure from Riverside Records. Even though Monk had already recorded all of the tracks on the album, with the exception of “Bright Mississippi”, in a variety of settings, the powerful cohesion of the quartet produced a first-rate work worthy of the praises it received when released, and which it still receives today. It was Monk’s best selling album ever.

In the late 1950s, it was common for big labels to record performances simultaneously in Mono and Stereo, and then releases both versions at the same time, with different reference numbers. This was explained at the time by the fact that Stereo was still a very recent innovation, and not everyone had sound systems capable of reproducing the new technology. The Stereo albums, thus, were slightly more expensive than their Mono counterparts. Over time, the Mono versions were condemned to oblivion, and only recently some music fans have begun to value these long forgotten masters, which capture classic performances from a different aural point of view. On the present release, both versions of this masterpiece can be compared.