Jazz Articles about Sonny Rollins

Sonny Rollins, Live at NJPAC

by Joel Roberts
May 25, 2011

Sonny RollinsNew Jersey Performing Arts CenterNewark, NJMay 13, 2011 The expectations for a Sonny Rollins concert have always been extraordinarily high. One anticipates waves of awe-inspiring solos and jaw-dropping feats of musical dexterity from the saxophone colossus, and more often than not, he delivers. But in recent years, something else has begun to happen when Rollins performs. As he ambled onto the stage at NJPAC in Newark, a stooped 80-year-old man with ...

Sonny Rollins en el Festival de Jazz de Barcelona

by Enrique Turpin
November 8, 2010

Sonny Rollins42 Voll-Damm Festival Internacional de Jazz de BarcelonaL'Auditori3 de noviembre, 2010 Sonny Rollins llegó a Barcelona para triunfar. Siempre vino a lo mismo, pero no lo logró en todas las ocasiones. Esta vez sí ocurrió, ya desde el mismo instante en el que se anunciaba que iba a ser reconocido con la medalla de oro del 42 Voll-Damm Festival Internacional de Jazz de la ciudad. Con el aforo completo de L'Auditori, el octogenario saxofonista ...

Sonny Brings the Presents to His Own 80th Birthday

by Dan Morgenstern
October 13, 2010

Sonny Rollins threw himself an 80th birthday party at New York's restored Beacon Theater on September 10---he was born on the 7th---and it was he who brought the gifts. And what a cornucopia! This was one of those rare times when you know that you're in the best of all possible places in the world. In inspired form, from first note to last, he never left the stage and, as is his wont, took no intermission. The silver--maned and bearded ...

Sonny Rollins: Vol. 1

by Matt Marshall
January 16, 2010

Sonny Rollins Vol. 1 Blue Note / Music Matters 2009 (1956)

Often lost and forgotten in the mix of spectacular albums saxophonist Sonny Rollins made for the Prestige label in 1956 (including “all-time" sets Saxophone Colossus and Tenor Madness) and his second Blue Note effort, Sonny Rollins Vol. 2 (1957), considered by some to be Rollins' greatest album of all, Sonny Rollins Vol. 1 is nevertheless an indelible piece of work. It would stand ...

Sonny Rollins Returns to the Kimmel Center

by Victor L. Schermer
October 5, 2009

Sonny RollinsVerizon HallKimmel Center for the Performing ArtsPhiladelphia, PennsylvaniaSeptember 25, 2009

Sonny Rollins has a large and enthusiastic fan base in Philadelphia so that, even in a time of economic recession, a packed house cheered on Rollins and his group as they provided a solid evening of straight ahead jazz with no intermission, and with a bebop and post-bop flavor that represented a shift from Rollins' previous engagement at the Kimmel Center in ...

Sonny Rollins: Saxophone Colossus

by Eric J. Iannelli
September 14, 2009

Bass drum. High hat. A primal, hollow beat in triple succession. The sequence repeats, increasingly accentuated with quick rim shot bursts and precision hits to the tom.

Then, stage set, the sax leaps in. A bright Caribbean calypso melody, its refrain only twelve notes long. Its vibrancy and simplicity give it an instantaneous appeal--fitting, given the song's roots in a nursery rhyme native to the Virgin Islands.

This, of course, is the familiar beginning of the Saxophone Colossus recording of ...

Clifford Brown / Sonny Rollins / Max Roach Quintet: Complete Studio Recordings

by Eric J. Iannelli
July 3, 2009

Even now, fifty-three years after Clifford Brown's untimely death (a multiple tragedy that also took the lives of pianist Richie Powell and his wife), his recordings are still being mined for fresh--or rather, refreshed-- releases. Although it's not entirely clear why this particular lineup merits this particular release at this particular time, any Brownie is good Brownie.That said, this is a release for neither longtime jazz listeners nor Brown devotees. It combines two easy-to- find 1956 albums, Clifford ...