Bird and Diz (and Monk)
This one has been getting a lot of play the past week or so while I'm making dinner. I'm playing it again tonight. I really like side 2 of this record.
I first heard this record in Japan, at a place called Shiramuren, run by an amazing, surly, one-armed guy with one of the greatest jazz collections I've ever seen. Anyway, apart from the grocery store I've only gone to two other places that I can think of during the pandemic. Both were record stores. One was Dave's, where I finally found an LP version of the CD I heard that night at Shiramuren.
Until I got the LP, I didn't know it was Monk on piano. There's a hilarious line in the liner notes, "Thelonius Monk, piano, who is a lesser light in Modern Jazz but, nevertheless, an important one..." Obviously written before he hit it big.
(One place I absolutely can't wait to go back to when I can travel again, Japan! Try and find Shiramuren again. Hopefully that old guy is still kicking...)