Home » Jazz Musicians » Elvis "Sonny" Gibson
Elvis "Sonny" Gibson
Drummer - Educator David F. Gibson’s Last Performance Is On Collaborative Project – Squeeze In Tight
Source:
SM Communication Solutions
Album is a tribute to the joy this gentle man left though his music and his life Jazz Power Initiative (JPI) co-founder, Managing and Artistic Director Eli Yamin, better known as Dr. E., got together with some of his favorite musicians and friends to make an album under the JPI label some months ago. The album, Squeeze In Tight, set for release on September 1st, is meant as a tribute “…to the joy that jazz and blues inspire,” said Dr. ...
read more
Backgrounder: Grant Green and Sonny Clark
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Throughout jazz history, there have been magical pairings of musicians in recording studios. Sometimes the union was established jointly by the two musicians. At other times, producers brought them together. These couplings include Louis Armstrong and Jack Teagarden, Bix Beiderbecke and Frankie Trumbauer, Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and John Coltrane, Shirley Scott and Stanley Turrentine, Sonny Stitt and Don Patterson, and Donald Byrd and Pepper Adams. Add to the list guitarist Grant Green and pianist Sonny Clark. ...
read more
Perfection: Sonny Stitt - Goin' Down Slow
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Today, I'm serving up two tracks for this week's Perfection entry, because as anyone who bought Sonny Stitt's LP Goin' Down Slow in 1972 knows, it's impossible to listen to the first without the second. The two featured tracks are Stitt's Miss Ann, Lisa, Sue and Sadie and Where Is Love by Lionel Bart from Oliver! The songs were recorded by Stitt in February 1972. Produced by Ozzie Cadena for Prestige, the first song featured Thad Jones (tp), Sonny Stitt (as), ...
read more
Backgrounder: Sonny Rollins - Alfie (1966)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
No album better reflects Sonny Rollins's personality than his Alfie: Original Music From the Score, arranged by Oliver Nelson. Recorded in New York in January 1966, the original music has his energy, passion, tenderness and his melancholy in one fell swoop. It's all very mid-1960s. To learn more about the recording, consult my two-part post on The Making of Alfie, from 2010. The first part was devoted to the popular song by Hal David and Burt Bacharach and the second ...
read more
New Video: Sonny Rollins at Ronnie Scott's, 1974
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
On July 17, 1974, Sonny Rollins appeared at Ronnie Scott's jazz club in London, two years after his 1972 comeback after a lengthy sabbatical. At the time, a film was shot, then shelved and now, for the first time, it's up online. Sonny's band at Ronnie Scott's featured Sonny Rollins (ts), Rufus Harley (ss,bagpies), Yoshiaki Masuo (el-g), Bob Cranshaw (el-b) and David Lee (d). Songs featured were The Cutting Edge, Don't Stop the Carnival, A House Is Not a Home, ...
read more
Backgrounder: Sonny Stitt's Night Crawler
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
When I was collecting Sonny Stitt albums as a kid in the early 1970s, my purchases divided into three categories: not bad, meh and perfection. Back then, there was no internet. Instead, I listened religiously to jazz FM radio stations and entered favorites in a small notebook that fit in my back pocket. Everyone I knew had one. Then you hunted for the ones on your list and took chances on others that either came highly recommended or looked good. ...
read more
Backgrounder: Sonny Stitt - Tune-Up!
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Perhaps the high points of Joe Fields's Cobblestone label were a pair of albums by Sonny Stitt released in 1972—Tune-Up! and Constellation. Both were produced by Don Schlitten. On Tunre-Up!, Stitt played alto and tenor saxophone and was accompanied by Barry Harris on piano, Sam Jones on bass and Alan Dawson on drums. What made this album (and Constellation) special was Stitt's commanding speed, clean lines and bebop fluidity. I remember buying both at Sam Goody in Manhattan that year ...
read more
Dazzling Live Sides By Sonny Rollins Receive First Authorized Release On Resonance's Record Store Day Offering 'Freedom Weaver: The 1959 European Tour Recordings'
Source:
Terri Hinte Publicity
Resonance Records, the award-winning home of archival jazz treasures, will proudly present a new, fully authorized live collection by tenor master Sonny Rollins, Freedom Weaver: The 1959 European Tour Recordings, as a limited edition four-LP set on Record Store Day, April 20. Never before issued as a legitimate release, these much-bootlegged sides—which feature Rollins, at the height of his early powers, with bassist Henry Grimes and drummers Pete La Roca, Kenny Clarke, and Joe Harris—will subsequently reach stores as a ...
read more
Backgrounder: Sonny Rollins Plus 4
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
The sound of the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet on their studio recordings for EmArcy starting in 1954 was unmistakable. Trumpeter Brown's pointed and lyrical blowing combined with Roach's restless drums and the deliberate sound of Harold Land's tenor saxophone poured the foundation for a new daring and elegant form of hard bop. By 1956, tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins had replaced Land. He did so after turning down Miles Davis's offer to join his quintet (John Coltrane would take the job). ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Sonny Rollins
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Sonny Rollins' birthday today!
It’s no state secret that Sonny Rollins has never been fond of the recording studio. Never mind that he’s recorded his full share of gems there—not only early, celebrated albums such as Saxophone Colossus and Way Out West, but also digital-era efforts such as Old Flames and This Is What I Do. The man often embraced as the greatest living improviser requires too much creative freedom to start playing, as he ...
read more
