Sonny Rollins
Saxophone Colossus

THE REVIEW

Recorded in 1956, "Saxophone Colossus" features tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins accompanied by Max Roach on drums, Tommy Flanagan on piano, and Doug Watkins on bass. Label: Prestige.

6 jewel tracks that escape routine, where the search for structure gives life to easily memorable melodic paths. Roach's drumming is even danceable as it intertwines with the melody of "St. Thomas". A masterful interpretation for the piece "You Don't Know What Love Is", a standard with a ballad flavor. A pinnacle of splendor in the original "Strode Rode". Prodigious is the closing track "Blue7", an example of how a creative musician can play with the blues structure, in a logic of strictly personal solos. The piece is indeed a subject of study for jazz theorists.

It is very likely that if Sonny Rollins had disappeared at the same age as Coltrane (and under the same circumstances), today he would be remembered, at the very least, with the same devotion as the latter. If Coltrane was a carefree saxophonist full of humor, whose solos sometimes went a bit too far, as if in a rush to outdo himself, Sonny was controlled and his solos easy to follow, from beginning to end.

If Coltrane's style was absolutely innovative and trending, Rollins' aimed at the attempt to recover the hard bop of Coleman Hawkins. Coltrane's untimely death disrupted the balance, tilting the sentimental scales in his favor and depriving jazz of a fruitful stylistic battle.

Suddenly, Rollins lost his friend (note the historic duet of "Tenor Madness") and his most serious antagonist, along with the stimulating necessity to create new aesthetics. This was followed by subsequent stylistic disorientation.