Only discovered in the 1980s, this five-track, 44-minute recording first released by Blue Note was done with a table-top mic by Naima (Juanita) Coltrane. Dating not from the famous 1957 residency of Monk’s quartet with Trane, Ware and Wilson, but from a single night when Trane depped for Johnny Griffin, it has less than optimum sound, where the piano is prominent in the mono mix and the saxophone is several feet away. Everything he plays is audible and, when Monk lays out for several choruses at a time, it’s crystal clear how far Coltrane is developing his late-1950s style. Haynes is recognisable (and was paid retrospectively by Blue Note) but his ‘I Mean You’ is a collectors’ item, as the drum solo uncharacteristically speeds up and is cut off abruptly by Monk’s return. The remaining two tracks totalling 11 minutes, claimed as being from the same date and first added by Phoenix stablemate Gambit, have a cleaner balance ‘engineered’ by Nellie Monk, probably near the start of the original quartet’s stint. Either way, provided you get your head around the sound (better than many later Trane bootlegs), this is a fascinating document.