Philips UK pressing, mastered locally from copy tapes, regular Philips UK 420 matrix Side 1, but partially-etched matrix on Side 2 – something I’ve not seen before on the normally very disciplined Philips production process. UK Riverside release, blue twin reels which date from a few years after the US release. Seems an appropriate parallel for Monk, and an improvement on the drab and golf-cap first cover of the US release (right) GorgeoSecond cover, by French post-impressionist Henri Rousseau, whose naïve primitive jungle paintings were disparaged by critics of the day, claiming to be shocked, and ridiculed them. Orin Keepnews thought he could reach a wider audience for Monk through the use of standard tunes, however a musician of Monk’s uncompromising originality was never going to be easily accepted by a large audience. The Critic says… with Caravan, Monk masters the Ellington material, more than a tune an instrumental composition. He willingly recorded two albums of jazz standards as a means of increasing his profile. Riverside managed to buy out his previous Prestige contract for a mere $108. Pettiford, phew! At the time of his signing to Riverside, Monk was highly regarded by his peers and by some critics, but his records did not sell in significant numbers, and his music was still regarded as too “difficult” for mass-market acceptance. Monk reinvents Ellington’s classic and the three swing like something else. Thelonious Monk (p) Oscar Pettiford (b) Kenny Clarke (d) recorded Rudy Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, July 21 & 27, 1955
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