Online Video Guide

Pianists Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk are first among equals on Chick's influence tree. He first heard and fell in love with their recordings in the early `50s, before he'd even reached his teens. Half a century later, they remain mentors, teachers and inspirations. Immersed in a musical universe of their own creation, these New York musical adventurers embodied their lives in their compositions. Twenty years ago, Chick recorded a tribute to Monk on ECM with Miroslav and Roy. In the '90s, he decided to offer an homage to Powell by forming this multi-generational quintet of players: Haynes the bebop veteran, of course; however, Terence Blanchard was only three and Joshua Redman and Christian McBride were not yet born when Powell died in 1966. But it is Corea's vitalizing piano soloing the passionate heart of the performance generating a sense of life and energy that brings everything alive.