The case for this album's value can be built simply. Forget the original track sequence. Begin with Hubbard's cover of "

The whole mélange is given a relaxed, live and down-home feel with Hunter's playing even sparer than usual. A mess? A contrived attempt

This kind of 'disco jazz funk', as it's called in the booklet, would have no doubt served the argument that the

Monk wasn't an album artist per se. Monk's Music [...] is contradictory: strident, reassuring, fractured, centered. It isn't perfect, whatever

This unusual set was one of the most successful uses of a gospel choir in a jazz context. Trumpeter Donald Byrd and a septet that