Jazz Articles about Sonny Rollins

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Sonny Rollins is My Rabbi

by Bret Primack
September 20, 2005

I remember, quite well, the first time I met Sonny Rollins. It was in the fall of 1978, when I was writing for Down Beat. For a cover story, I traveled to his upstate New York home for an interview with the Saxophone Colossus. Over the years, I'd heard his music, both on recordings, and some remarkable performances. I'd also read all about this fellow and the more dramatic episodes of his life. Although he had a reputation ...

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Sonny Rollins: Tanglewood 2005

by Scott H. Thompson
September 9, 2005

It was a beautiful, sunny Sunday morning in New England, while down South, New Orleans, the birthplace of jazz, lay in ruin. Devastated by Hurricane Katrina. I made my way to a 9:15am church service, and then headed out onto the highway for another church service. The church of Sonny Rollins. Driving straight north through the center of Connecticut, take a left at the Massachusetts Turnpike, then a scenic drive west to the Berkshires and the Tanglewood Jazz ...

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Sonny Rollins: Without a Song: The 9/11 Concert

by Paul Olson
September 7, 2005

No living tenor player has added more to the jazz vocabulary than Sonny Rollins, and anyone compiling even a conservative list of essential Rollins recordings is going to have great trouble keeping it down in single digits. But as a concert performer, Rollins can be among the most frustrating of artists. Part of that is due to his stubbornly personal notion of what constitutes a good song (this obstreperousness is an inseparable part of his greatness), and part of it ...

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Sonny Rollins: Worktime & The Sound of Sonny

by Javier AQ Ortiz
August 12, 2005

The following recordings represent stations in the mid-50s...-as vital a period in Sonny Rollins' career as any as much of his reputation was built upon this period. The earliest of the two finds Rollins wondering whether he could perform after kicking his heroin habit, signalling his return to the jazz scene after rehab; the latter has the saxophonist fully pursuing his musical beliefs, with his previous fears already allayed.

Sonny Rollins Worktime Fantasy ...

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Sonny Rollins: A Night At The Village Vanguard

by C. Michael Bailey
August 10, 2005

Sonny Rollins A Night At The Village Vanguard Blue Note 99795 1957/1999 (Rudy Van Gelder Edition)

Located on 7th Avenue just below West 11th Street in New York City's Greenwich Village, the Village Vanguard has been the seat of live jazz since the 1940s. Ninety-one live recordings have been made at the Vanguard between 1957 and 2001, chronicling the whole of the history of jazz. What was the first live recording made ...

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Sonny Rollins: Jazz Cleric

by Riel Lazarus
August 20, 2004

Sonny Rollins is his own man, plain and simple. His heart thumps to a singular beat - a tempo we all tune into occasionally with reverence and wonder. For nearly 60 years now, the tenor saxophonist has brandished a long and heavy horn - contributing to several movements in jazz; setting new standards for improvisation; relentlessly moving, evolving, eluding typecasts; never indulging in pressures to conform, streamline or sanitize his music; and always adhering to his own philosophies of life ...

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Sonny Rollins: The Cutting Edge

by Kyle Simpler
June 3, 2004

Sonny Rollins, The Cutting Edge by Richard Palmer Continuum Books

Besides being one of the most influential tenor saxophone players in jazz history, Sonny Rollins also happens to be one of its most enigmatic figures as well. Given his introspective nature and penchant for withdrawal, Rollins easily comes across as somewhat of an existentialist. Now British jazz writer Richard Palmer presents a worthwhile look at the musical life of this legendary artist with Sonny ...