Happy Birthday to the Tenor Titan
In 2002, I was given the plum assignment of selecting the material and writing the liner notes for a Sonny Rollins anthology of RCA Victor recordings called Tenor Titan. I was limited to an hour’s worth of music, but even if I’d been granted the full 75-minute capacity of a CD, the task would have been daunting. Given the wide range of material that Rollins recorded over six albums between 1962 and ’64, paring it down to a representative sampling made for a colossal challenge. To be sure, it also felt like an indulgence to be deeply immersed in Sonny’s music for a couple of weeks.
Tenor Titan includes three songs by Jerome Kern (an obvious Rollins favorite among songwriters), including “All the Things You Are” from Sonny Meets Hawk, his encounter with his boyhood idol, Coleman Hawkins; “Long Ago and Far Away,” from The Standard Sonny Rollins, his last date with guitarist Jim Hall; and “Dearly Beloved,” from Our Man in Jazz, the session with Don Cherry and Billy Higgins of the historic Ornette Coleman Quartet. (The latter was an easy choice since the Rollins originals on the date, “Doxy” and “Oleo,” run 15 and 25 minutes respectively.)
“The Bridge,” the title track of the album that marked his return to the scene after nearly two years of woodshedding on the Williamsburg Bridge, struck me as the set’s one inevitable selection. Here a live version from Jazz Casual with Bob Cranshaw on bass and Ben Riley on drums.
Also from The Bridge, I chose “God Bless the Child,” which has always impressed me as Sonny’s finest ballad performance of the period. Rollins has long hailed Billie Holiday, who lived nearby in Harlem during his youth, as an influence for the emotional depth and individuality of her artistry. Eric Nisenson quotes Rollins in Open Sky: Sonny Rollins and His World of Improvisation on Lady Day: “I was in a cab with her one time, and when the cab stopped short, she almost fell out of her seat. This was not too long before she died. I tried to know her because I was really in love with her, just as a person. I was more of a fan than anything. She gave me her book [Lady Sings the Blues] and she autographed it. I befriended her and she let me accompany her home. It was wonderful to know that Billie Holiday could trust me.”
Rollins recorded an album of modern jazz originals in 1964 that was released as Now’s The Time. I chose his trio take on Dizzy Gillespie’s bebop classic “Blue’n’Boogie” for Tenor Titan, and Miles Davis’s “Four” allowed me to include one of the titles that Herbie Hancock had recorded with the master. I book-ended the album with songs reflecting Sonny’s West Indian ancestry and his penchant for calypso, “St. Thomas” and “Don’t Stop the Carnival.” The latter was given its premier recording in 1964 complete with a vocal chorus and a trio of percussionists, and it’s gone on to rival “St. Thomas” as his most-played West Indian stomp. The ringer of the anthology was “Bluesongo,” which Sonny recorded with his longtime bassist Bob Cranshaw, and Candido on bongos.
Earlier this year, The Sunday Times published Sonny’s recollection of his time on the Williamsburg Bridge. Click here to read “Sax and Sky.”
Today is Sonny’s 85th birthday. I posted an album with 25 images of Rollins on Facebook today. It’s drawn hundreds of views and several timely comments. Click here to see for yourself.
Speaking of Jerome Kern songs, here’s Rollins playing “I’m Old Fashioned” at the Bern International Jazz Festival in 1985. No superlatives have been wasted on Rollins, but Saxophone Colossus, which he was dubbed as a 25-year-old, still captures the grandeur of the man, his art, and his achievement. It comes to mind virtually every time I hear him, and certainly as he appears in this performance filmed when he was 55.