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Thelonious Monk: Monk's Dream

Thelonious Monk: Monk's Dream

Mobile Fidelity  UDSACD 2207

Stereo Hybrid

Jazz


Thelonious Monk


Mastered from the Original Master Tapes for Audiophile Sound and Limited to 3,000 Copies: Hybrid SACD of 1963 Set Features Stunning Clarity, Responsiveness, and Presence
The historical import, musical genius, and timeless artistry of Monk's Dream can be best appreciated by first placing the record in the context of its era. In short, Thelonious Monk's joyful Columbia Records debut triggered a domino effect of mainstream attention, best-selling success, and across-the-board respect that led him to become one of only six jazz musicians to ever grace the cover of Time – then America's most widely read weekly magazine. Couple the extraordinary feat with the fact the British Invasion and Beatlemania were already in full swing, and the cultural significance – not to mention its place in the jazz canon – of Monk's Dream skyrockets to near-unthinkable heights.

Mastered from the original master tapes and strictly limited to 3,000 numbered copies, Mobile Fidelity's numbered-edition hybrid SACD pays tribute to the 1963 album's merit and enhances the music for generations to come. Surpassing the sonics even afforded by ORG's long-out-of-print disc and greatly improving on every other version extant, this audiophile-grade collector's edition strips away any lingering audio limitations to provide a clear, transparent, and up-close view of a set that inspired DownBeat to award the record a five-star review in which critic Pete Welding correctly proclaimed it "a stunning reaffirmation of [Monk's] powers as a performer and composer."

Such potency reveals itself as all the more obvious on an SACD afforded stellar reproduction of the multi-layered complexities, challenging tonalities, and nontraditional rhythms that conspire to place Monk's finest outings in a league of their own. Accurately portraying the complete scale of a piano remains one of the most difficult tasks to accomplish on a recording. And yet the sound of Monk's instrument here captures its wide-bandwidth frequency response and inner cavity, allowing notes to individually register all the while pairing with succeeding and decaying chords in seamless fashion. The presence, tones, and contributions of the colleagues surrounding Monk – tenor saxophonist Charlie Rouse, bassist John Ore, and drummer Frankie Dunlop – come across, too, with a lifelike realism rivaled only by sitting in an intimate club.

Benefitting from the newfound immediacy, clarity, and ink-black backgrounds on Mobile Fidelity's reissue are five originals and three covers that demonstrate the boundless vistas of Monk's vision, aptitude, and inventiveness. As acclaimed scribe Gary Giddins wrote while reminding us the North Carolina native's motto was "jazz is freedom," Monk's Dream exposes his "dauntless concentration, impressive faith, and an almost childlike glee." These traits spark works such as the spry interpretation of "Body and Soul," which Monk handles sans accompaniment, and guide the quirky angles that snake around and shape "Bolivar Blues," the title of which refers to a Manhattan hotel.

Throughout, Monk's Dream conveys an exhilarating freedom that mirrors the improvisational twists, dissonant techniques, and melodic turns Monk embraced not only in the studio (and on the stage) but in everyday life. Considered by some to be too idiosyncratic for his own good, his flawless craftsmanship, underlying irreverence, and deep-seated knowledge of swing, stride, blues, and gospel raise this 1963 album to mythical levels – and let the inner contours, deliberate phrasings, and urgent solos on tracks like "Bye-Ya" and the title cut exhibit new details, themes, and directions with each listen.

Indeed, above everything, Monk's Dream encourages constant exploration and repeat plays. Forever bursting with fresh ideas, it refuses to stand still, instead buzzing with the energy of a city celebrating its internal commotion and dancing to the influences that made its current modernism possible. Monk was just decades ahead of everyone else in figuring out how this seemingly incongruent yet delightfully cool tango sounded. Fortunately for the rest of us, he documented it and called it Monk's Dream.

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Reviews (1)

Review by Mark Werlin - July 20, 2020

I don’t always go out of my way to collect alternative remasters of recordings – especially SACDs – when I already own a version that I enjoy; Mobile Fidelity is the exception. There isn’t a single instance in my music collection of a remastered jazz or rock SACD where another label’s SACD version sounds better than the MoFi reissue. With that in mind, and prompted by site members who commented favorably about the MoFi SACD of Monk's Dream, I paid the $30.

Did I buy the MoFi disc out of curiosity or dissatisfaction? To be honest: a mix of both. Audiophile jazz collectors are forever paying the price to hear a rediscovered original master tape, or a newer and better-sounding transfer of an old favorite recording.

Multiple versions of the same recording in hand, we compare the qualities of one versus another. But without a trustworthy provenance for the different versions, subjective listening evaluations of analogue-era recordings remastered to SACD inevitably run into a wall of unanswerable questions: what was the source tape; when was that tape transferred, and by whom; did the mastering include an interim high-resolution PCM stage, to allow for equalization or to address tape deterioration artifacts, or was the tape output sent straight to DSD?

When releases are not accompanied by provenance and mastering details, collectors have no objective criteria to make a purchasing decision. In the case of Blue Note reissues in high-res download format, most do not include the name of the mastering engineer or any details about the source tape, information that was generally included on physical copy reissues.

Fortunately, that is not the case in the present release of "Monk's Dream", which MoFi clearly labels "Original Master Recording." That unequivocal designation guided my listening comparison between the MoFi SACD and the ORG SACD.

In my review of the ORG SACD Thelonious Monk Quartet: Monk's Dream, I wrote:

"The ORG SACD sounds analogue-like, slightly rolled off on the top, detailed and warm. But the provenance of the tape, the name of the remastering engineer, and the method of transfer to DSD are not included in the SACD liner notes or posted on ORG's website or their distributor's website, so your ears will have to be your guide."

Because I do not own two identical SACD players, there was the only way for me to do a listening comparison; a method we are not permitted to discuss on this site, but which is used by many computer audiophiles. By this approach I could listen to all or a portion of a track from one version, and then listen to the other, with only a few seconds delay. To avoid room artifacts and the coloration of my tube/solid state hybrid amp, I used a very revealing and sonically neutral ESS9038 Pro DAC and good-quality planar headphones.

On first listening, the two releases did not sound as dissimilar as I imagined they would. It seemed that both might have been mastered from the same tape, and that any sonic differences were the result of different reproducing recorders and electronics. But repeated plays leads me to conclude that the ORG SACD mastering included an EQ stage, which would more likely have been done in the digital domain than by running the tape output into an outboard analogue equalizer.

In the piano intro to "Bolivar Blues", Monk taps his foot on the studio floor, audible on both SACDs, but on the ORG disc, the tapping is louder and has a bass-ier tone. When the band enters, the difference between the two discs becomes even clearer. On the ORG version, John Ore's bass low-end sounds bloated, the cymbals don't have much air around them, and the piano seems, for lack of a better word and at the risk of being factually inaccurate, digitized. I wouldn't use that descriptor if I knew with certainty that the ORG SACD was mastered directly from an analogue tape.

The MoFi SACD is worth acquiring even if you already have the ORG SACD because Shawn R. Britton transferred the actual source tape — by the label's designation, the Original Master Recording — and the same cannot be determined of the ORG version. The MoFi SACD would be worth the price for Monk's performance of "Bolivar Blues", an astonishing display of technical virtuosity and stylistic inspiration: dense, rhythmically complex opening choruses; aggressive, staccato single-note lines; spacious chordal phrases; a nostalgic, Tatum-esque stride into the head melody at the conclusion.

I wish Columbia's engineers had recorded the piano in the center channel on all the tracks, not only the solo piano performances. As the final chord of "Bolivar Blues" fades to silence and the solo piece "Just a Gigolo" begins, you'll hear a dramatic difference in presentation between the hard-right placement of the piano in the group performances and the front-and-center placement (and perhaps a different mic array) in the unaccompanied solos.

A splendid performance in gorgeous recorded sound; not a note wasted.

Copyright © 2020 Mark Werlin and HRAudio.net

Performance:

Sonics:

stars stars
Comments (13)

Comment by SVL1970 - October 1, 2019 (1 of 13)

I cannot recommend this for one simple reason - I have got a defective pressing of this SACD from MoFi that stucks or skips in several places on several different tracks on a machine that plays all other SACDs (hybrid or single layer, AP, Japanese and other MoFI) just fine. Before we can discuss the sonics of this reissue, MoFi should get their act together and make a disc that can be played. Once they actually achieve that, we can talk about the relative advantages (or lack thereof) of this version.

In response to: Comment by Downunderman - Today 06:25 pm (2 of 3)

No, there does not appear to be any physical damage, at least as far as I can see. Most of the sticking is at the beginning of Track 1, so any damage should conceivably have been close to the inner edge of the disc, and I cannot see anything there.

Comment by Downunderman - October 1, 2019 (2 of 13)

That's worrying. This is a disk I have been thinking of stumping up for myself.

Is there any indication of the problem from physically looking at the disk surface?

Comment by Mark Werlin - October 1, 2019 (3 of 13)

Did you purchase the disc from MoFi's parent company, Music Direct? In any case, you should return it right away for a refund or replacement. MoFi will determine the nature of the defect and notify the manufacturing plant.

I don't have this title yet, but every other MoFi SACD in my collection plays without any problems on both my SACD players (Marantz and Oppo).

Comment by SVL1970 - October 1, 2019 (4 of 13)

No, I purchased it from a different online retailer, whose name has the word "acoustic" in it;) I agree that I should probably return it, although it may be a bit of a hassle in my case.

Comment by breydon_music - October 2, 2019 (5 of 13)

This disc has been on my shelves for a few weeks but various things, including a planned holiday, had kept it there until now! Having just played it I can reassure prospective purchasers that, on my Esoteric machine at any rate, it all plays without a hitch. I'll leave others to provide a detailed appraisal of it, but suffice to say it seems to me to be a killer transfer - amazing presence and a real sense of all the musicians in a tangible space. Just gripping throughout! And was there ever a better version of "Sweet and Lovely"? At times Monk seems to be trapping the tune inbetween the notes he plays. A bit like someone trying to swot a fly with a newspaper - he kills it!

Comment by Mark Werlin - October 2, 2019 (6 of 13)

breydon_music: thanks for checking the SACD on your player and sharing your listening impressions.

SVL1970: if you don't get a satisfactory response from the seller, contact me through my HRAudio email address (linked in the About page). I plan to be in contact with MoFi later this year and perhaps could work something out.

Comment by Longjohns and Wifebeaters - October 5, 2019 (7 of 13)

Is this a re-release (or maybe slightly tweaked version) of ORGSA0193 -- does anybody know?

I'm just wondering why MoFi would re-release an SACD that just came out not so long ago, while there are other Monk albums that haven't seen a daylight yet in DSD/SACD that are arguably even better than this.

And the excellent ORG SACD of this sold out very quickly, which means the market may already have to a large extent been saturated. In which case duplicating their release would only make sense on some kind of licensing deal that would require no great amount of additional engineering hours from MoFi.

Just curious, as this is not the only case of something like this happening with MoFi IIRC (re-releasing SACDs that someone else just brought out not long ago but then withdrew from the market).

EDIT: Well, on a quick look it even seems the ORG SACD is still widely available (Thelonious Monk Quartet: Monk's Dream), which then makes this re-release decision by MoFi even more baffling. (Although I do know ORG ceased producing SACDs altogether, which may then be why.)

Comment by breydon_music - October 6, 2019 (8 of 13)

Having had (and still, at this moment, having) both, I can say beyond any possibility of error that they are not the same. Mark has left an in-depth review of the ORG (which is a great background to the disc anyway) where he notes that ORG were very coy about the source of their issue. MoFi are quite clear about theirs, and, just like their Mingus disc, pending Mark's more detailed comments, I can say that the clarity, presence and musicality of the MoFI are just amazing. It's a wonderful disc so don't hesitate!

Comment by Mark Werlin - October 9, 2019 (9 of 13)

In response to breydon_music’s comments about the difference in sound between the ORG and MoFi SACD’s: if I didn’t notice these kinds of differences, I wouldn’t have so many duplicate titles in my collection! I’ll order a copy of the MoFi release and review it soon. (MoFi does not provide me with reviewer copies— all of their SACDs in my collection were purchased.)

I recently listened to a sample of “Gentle Ben” mastered to DSD by 2XHD. It sounds noticeably warmer than Kevin Gray’s SACD for Analogue Productions, especially the piano. It’s likely that both versions were sourced from the same tape; but the kind of tape recorders and electronics used in the transfers resulted in different sounding presentations.

MoFi and AP are generally transparent about sources, but some other labels are either worried that we won’t buy their products if they are derived from copies, rather than original master tapes; or they’re under contractual restrictions with the licensor not to disclose the source.

Comment by Downunderman - December 10, 2019 (10 of 13)

Mine is # 382 and it plays through perfectly.

And in comparison to the Org it is a smoother more organic and natural sounding remaster. lovely really.

PS. I agree with Longjohns all the same. There are plenty of other magnificent titles out there that have yet to Hit the SACD Masterer's couch that should have priority over a re-do.......including from Thelonious himself.

Comment by Postercowboy - May 2, 2020 (11 of 13)

I have the ORG disc, so I was somewhat hesitant to buy yet another duplicate. I‘m very glad I did, as the MoFi version presents a wider and deeper soundstage and sounds more natural and organic. In direct comparison, the improvement is quite significant. Very much worth the purchase.

Comment by Mark Werlin - July 23, 2020 (12 of 13)

After listening more closely to the MoFi SACD and writing the review, I removed my recommendation from the ORG SACD. I agree with all the commenters that the MoFi SACD has superior sound quality.

In 2017, Sony released a 24/96 download of a later Monk Columbia album, "Underground". It's a decent transfer, but the sound quality is not as good as MoFi's "Monk's Dream".

Comment by aubullience - November 23, 2020 (13 of 13)

I own both SACD releases of this album and agree with what the other commenters here have stated regarding the superiority of the MoFi release of this title over the ORG one, and the ways in which it is better.
That being said, had I never purchased the MOFI SACD, I would not have missed it- IMO the ORG SACD is still an excellent-sounding one, but the MOFI simply betters it by a modest margin- and so if someone already owns the ORG release of this title, I would only recommend re-purchasing it if you are a big fan of this album.
I'm a huge fan of it- probably my favorite by Monk, along with Monk's Music- and so it was worth it!