*** Fred Hersch

THELONIOUS: FRED HERSCH PLAYS MONK

(Nonesuch)

Another Monk tribute? Leave it to pianist Fred Hersch to breath some life into a tired concept. Hersch understands the architecture of Monk's tunes: many of this album's dozen selections offer ingenious variations and paraphrases. But he's also different enough from Monk to come at the material from unique angles -- Monk ambushed by lyricism.

The attraction lies in hearing the many subtle and surprising ways Hersch accommodates Monk's conception of the piano with his own. There are Monkish angles protruding from the softer ripples of a meditation on "Crepuscule with Nellie." Hersch builds his solo on "Think of One" by playfully repositioning the spaces in the melody while his characteristic voicings and wider dynamic range flesh out the tune without changing its essential character. He embellishes "Evidence" with sly riffs that peek out between the interstices of Monk's tune. And on the brilliant "Five Views of Misterioso," one of the most skeletal of Monk's compositions, he coaxes shades of meaning from a few notes by simple variations in touch, dynamics, and tempo. It's an insightful, economical performance worthy of the composer himself.

-- Ed Hazell