Product Description







"Julius Monk Presents Pieces Of Eight Upstairs At The Downstairs"(Off-Beat 4016)-LP.
Tracklist
A1 Overture and Gala Opening
A2 Happiness Is A Bird
A3 And Then I Wrote...
A4 Radio City Music Hall
A5 Miss Williams
A6 The Uncle Bergie Evans Show
A7 Oriental
A8 Ardent Admirer
A9 Steel Guitars and Barking Seals
B1 Election Spectacular
B2 Seasons' Greetings
B3 A Name Of Our Own
B4 M'Lady Chatterley
B5 Farewell
B6 The Night The Hurricane Struck
B7 Everybody Wants To Be Loved
B8 A Conversation Piece
Monk was born into a well-heeled and well-established family of North Carolina. After training at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, he earned his living playing piano in New York City and France, then became manager (1942) of the New York nightclub Le Ruban Bleu, owned by his associate Herbert Jacoby. In 1956, Monk left that establishment for San Francisco's the hungry i, where he did duty as master of ceremonies. Soon, however, Murray Grand, new manager of the Downstairs Room (formerly the Purple Onion), recalled Monk to Manhattan. On March 4, 1956, his opening revue, Four Below (starring Dody Goodman) was a triumph. (It was characterized as "the first legitimate cafe revue in New York City" by James Gavin, author of the 1991 book Intimate Nights, The Golden Age of New York Cabaret.[2]) At the new venue (officially: the Upstairs At The Downstairs, West 56th Street) Monk then staged a succession of revues by writers such as Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt (later collaborators on The Fantasticks), Louis Botto, Sheldon Harnick, Herb Hartig, Gerry Matthews, John Meyer and Tom Poston.Monk's annual revues established the standard for New York cabaret over the following decade: Take Five (1957), Demi-Dozen (1958), Four Below Strikes Back (1959), Pieces of Eight (1959), Dressed to the Nines (1960) and 7 Come 11 (1961). Performers hired and/or cultivated by Monk include Jean Arnold, Michael Brown, Ceil Cabot, Thelma Carpenter, Pat Carroll, Imogene Coca, Jane and Gordon Connell, Blossom Dearie and Annie Ross; collaborators and associates also included Robert Downey, Sr., George Furth, Alice Ghostley, Ronny Graham, Tammy Grimes, Ellen Hanley, Bill Hinnant, Susan Johnson, Liberace, Dorothy Loudon, Portia Nelson, Bibi Osterwald, Norman Paris, Lovelady Powell, Caspar Reardon, Rex Robbins, William Roy, Maxine Sullivan, Nancy Dussault, Sylvia Syms, Fredricka Weber and Mary Louise Wilson. The LP has been autographed on the front cover by Julius Monk with a fountain pen in black.....CONDITION OF VINYL,COVER AND AUTOGRAPH IS VG.