TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET
Start saving your jazz hands. As part of TCM’s twice-weekly June tribute to jazz in film, tonight’s prime-time lineup is populated by two seminal jazz documentaries. The first is this 1959 account of the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, which showcased all manner of old and new music. Included on the bill: jazz great Louis Armstrong, younger pioneer Thelonious Monk, singers Dinah Washington and Mahalia Jackson… and, sliding over from the then-new genre of rock ’n’ roll, Chuck Berry.
TCM, 9:30 p.m. ET
Straight, No Chaser is the name of a 1967 album by bebop pianist and composer Thelonious Monk, which both wowed and challenged listeners at the time. It’s also the name of this 1988 documentary biography about his life and music. Charlotte Zwerin directs, and the executive producer is Clint Eastwood, revealing his deep passion for jazz music quite early in his own career. And there’s a lot of John Coltrane in here, too…