Conversations in Jazz by Ralph J. Gleason

Author:Ralph J. Gleason
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: 2016-06-14T16:00:00+00:00

Sonny Rollins

APRIL 15, 1959

As the 1960s dawned, jazz fans debated who was the greatest saxophonist on the scene. And the disputants invariably fell into two camps: one group picked John Coltrane, and the other opted for Sonny Rollins. Coltrane was the visionary whose music sought a quasi-spiritual transcendence, while Rollins fought it out in the trenches, presenting a muscular tone and trusting the inspiration of the moment as he worked endless variations on every kind of melody, whether populist or sophisticated. Like planetary giants, these two tenorists tended to stay in their own orbits, but when they met head-to-head—as on the 1956 recording “Tenor Madness”—who dared judge that either of these masters deserved second place?

But Coltrane passed away in 1967, leaving Rollins to reign unchallenged for decades to come. And even when jazz styles changed and rivals came and went, he stayed at the very top, inspiring each succeeding generation of players with his sound and style, both widely imitated although never surpassed.

Even at the peak of his fame, Rollins never took much notice of the praise and remained his own fiercest critic. The most famous moment in his career occurred away from the bandstands and recording studios, when he temporarily retired to focus on practice and self-improvement. At the end of the 1950s, jazz fans who wanted to hear the inimitable Mr. Rollins were advised to hang out on New York’s Williamsburg Bridge, where this master of the horn would play for hours at a stretch, lost in the reveries of his own private music making.

Sonny Rollins spoke to Ralph Gleason just a few months before he embarked on this period of reclusion—an interlude that would last more than two years. “I want to reach people,” Rollins explains here, then quickly adds: “Only if I can satisfy my own level.” Although Rollins has given many interviews over the years, this frank conversation captures his outlook at what, in retrospect, must be seen as the most important juncture of his long career.

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