When I have a guest on, usually they put an album out or I have them on because they’re coming to town. My guest, Jon Batiste, has three records out that came out on August 14. Three albums! And they’re all a part of the Jon Batiste Piano Series, starting with Black Mozart (Batiste Piano Series Vol. 2) where Jon reimagines Mozart through Black American musical traditions. Another one, Monk Meditations, is a deeply personal exploration of Thelonious Monk and finally, Monk Movements (Batiste Piano Series Vol. 4), another Thelonious Monk-focused project emphasizing movement, improvisation and Jon Batiste’s own interpretation of Monk’s musical language.
Jon Batiste is a very busy cat but he always finds a way to join me in the Gumbo Kitchen. I chatted with him the other day, here’s our conversation.
You take a song like “Für-Elise” that was composed over 200 years ago. In 2026, all my thirteen-year old child needs to hear is that interval and they know exactly what it is. It’s in our DNA, isn’t it?
Yes, it does! The thing about these melodies is that the highest honour of a composer is that your music exists in the world, in people’s lives, in different ways and different expressions, without them even having to know it was you that made it. It’s just a melody that’s just transcendent and timeless.
Now, you hear a parallel between Thelonious Monk and Mozart, what is that parallel?
I think Monk and Mozart are long-lost brothers of 250 years, brothers from another mother. They’re different but they have a kinship that’s very much a part of their ability to speak both on the most complex level and also to have these melodies that feel childlike, like it could be a nursery rhyme or a lullaby. They are masters of structure, form and melody. And they both, especially Mozart’s late work, have this metaphysical spirituality that feels like it’s tapping into perspective on life.
How much of these records are improvised? And how much did you go in knowing exactly what you were going to do?
I really wanted to do something I could organize the form and structure of what I wanted to do while keeping the essence of the original so it’s more like I’m in conversation with Mozart, I’m in conversation with Thelonious as if we were both sitting at the piano stoop trading bars. I wanted to organize that in my mind and then leave room for me to surprise myself. I left the mic so that you would feel like you were sitting next to me and you could hear even in the microphone captures my exclamation of discovery and moments where I surprise myself when something spontaneously occurs. Each of these albums were recorded in one session so it could feel both spontaneous and structured in a way that keeps the essence of the original.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.