Latest Release
- 26 APR 2024
- 18 Songs
- A Night At the Village Vanguard, Vol. 1 (Live) · 1957
- Sonny Rollins, Vol. 2 · 1957
- A Weaver of Dreams (Live in Singerzaal, Laren, Holland, February 21, 1959) - Single · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
- A Night At The Village Vanguard (The Complete Masters) · 2024
Essential Albums
- After some great side work with Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis and The Modern Jazz Quartet, as well as few excellent albums as a band leader, Sonny Rollins became a jazz giant with 1956’s Saxophone Colossus. He’s front and center from the get-go, leading a quartet through his signature “St. Thomas”, which melds calypso rhythms with his singular style of extemporaneous riffing. Pure elegance follows, punctuated by a landmark version of “Moritat” (“Mack the Knife”), where he effortlessly turns the Three Penny Opera tune inside out.
Singles & EPs
Live Albums
Appears On
- Miles Davis
- Thelonious Monk
About Sonny Rollins
For generations, Sonny Rollins has not only set the standard on tenor saxophone—he's elevated jazz as a whole, embodying what many regard as the essence of a great improviser. Schooled on the job by Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk, the NYC-born Rollins landed a key gig with the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet in 1955. But even in the midst of huge success, he strove to play better—to be truer to his creative intentions. Possessed of a monastic self-discipline, Rollins took sabbaticals for practice and introspection, most famously from 1959 to 1961, when he could be seen woodshedding on the Williamsburg Bridge in New York. He strove for a more joyously melodic approach and a big sound while showing daunting facility with the harmonic demands of bebop and post-bebop. He reconciles influences from calypso to free jazz to pop, and he can transform the simplest showtune into a thing of enduring beauty. And a half-century of yoga practice also opened doors in his work to a more authentic expression of the self: witness his endurance on the solo intro to “Autumn Nocturne”, from 1978's Don’t Stop the Carnival, for an almost meditative experience.
- HOMETOWN
- New York, NY, United States
- BORN
- 7 September 1930
- GENRE
- Jazz