WEBVTT

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"Thelonious Monk."

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Someone told me this.

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Well, I read this
poem once, and someone

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told me this story
about Thelonious Monk.

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I read it at a prison.

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Some guy came up to me
after the reading and said,

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you know, you know
how Thelonious did it?

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I mean, even though Thelonious
has-- this really strange way

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of playing a solo.

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And the guy came up to me and
said, you know how he did that?

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I said, no, I don't know.

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He said, well, I lived in
Thelonious's neighborhood

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and I grew up with
him, you know?

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And, yeah, he told me this
story about Thelonious used to--

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you'd be walking
down the street,

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and you'd see Thelonious
walking down the street.

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And you'd see him walk
over to a lamppost.

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He'd walk over to the
lamppost and put his head

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to the lamppost.

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And he'd come back and
try to get the hum-- put

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the hum into his piano.

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That's how he did it.

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That's what he did, man.

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And I said, well, OK.

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And I love stories about--

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I mean, I'm really just
open with jazz stories.

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People come to me and tell
me these outrageous stories

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about jazz figures.

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And I go, oh, that's fine.

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I love the stories, and I don't
care whether it's true or not.

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I just love the stories.

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So, "Thelonious Monk--" I'm
a real sucker for stories.

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"I know what to do with math.

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Listen to this.

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It's arithmetic, a
soundtrack, the motion

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frozen in these lampposts.

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It can be sung.

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I can lift away
its logic, make it

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spin like an orbital satellite,
find gambling's true pitch.

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It can be played.

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Adventure, the trying of
patience, holding back,

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holding up, laying out,
stop-time, slow motion,

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time travel, spacewalking.

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It can be splintered,
strained through the fine

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mesh of a second.

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Now I try a few
bars of what's next?

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Run it over my hands, ignite
it, make the fire sound

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like April in Paris."

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