Sonny Rollins - The Freelance Years: The Complete Riverside and Contemporary Recordings

Sonny Rollins has been a major figure in jazz since the 1950s, a titanic improviser whose weighty sound and speech-like ease have embodied a larger-than-life personality--swaggering, comic, soaring, and tender by turns. For all that career longevity, though, his most creative work dates from the flowering of his talent in the late '50s, when he emerged as a dominant presence after years as a sideman with Miles Davis and Max Roach. He had developed a unique gift for the extended solo, creating remarkable musical architecture with fragments of melody and infinitely varied rhythmic patterns. His sense of swing was extraordinary. He would do everything possible not to swing--from false slowdowns to on-the-beat accents--while still somehow driving forward. During that time he recorded for most of the important independent jazz labels, and his Complete Prestige and Complete Blue Note recordings have already appeared. This five-disc set comprises all his work for the New York Riverside and Los Angeles Contemporary labels, recorded between December 1956 and October 1958, and as such forms a remarkable portrait of the period as well as its outstanding soloist. The set includes all of Rollins's sideman appearances for Riverside, all made in Roach's creative orbit. There's a quintet date with trumpeter Kenny Dorham that adds harp to a rendition of "My Old Flame," another with Abbey Lincoln that brings gritty realism and high drama to jazz singing, and Thelonious Monk's essential Brilliant Corners. Rollins also leads terrific sessions with pianists Sonny Clark and Hampton Hawes and guitarist Barney Kessel, with a repertoire from "Toot, Toot, Tootsie" to a theme from Tchaikovsky's "Pathetique" symphony. Though he would already go as far as solo saxophone for a version of "It Could Happen to You," Rollins is at his very best--both his wittiest and most profound--with just bass and drum accompaniment. The first Contemporary recording, originally released as Way Out West, plays with the East-West rivalry then current in jazz. Rollins, the quintessential East Coaster, is clearly having great fun applying himself to "I'm an Old Cowhand" and "Wagon Wheels," and that only feeds the level of group invention with Roy Brown and Shelly Manne. Amidst all this great music, the crowning touch is the Freedom Suite session, with Rollins working through the 20-minute title track and a series of standards with superb support and interplay from Roach and Oscar Pettiford. It's essential music, rivaled by only two contemporaneous recordings in the Rollins canon, Saxophone Colossus and A Night at the Village Vanguard. --Stuart Broomer Amazon.com

It doesn't get any better than this!

The 50s were an incredible time for jazz, with so many major figures reaching their peak, and here is Rollins playing with Thelonious Monk, Kenny Dorham, Max Roach and Abbey Lincoln, not to mention cutting his incredible Freedom Suite, all within a short span of three years. It is not surprising he took a break after this tremendous outpouring.

The box set starts with selections from Brilliant Corners, led by Thelonious Monk, and closes with Sonny Rollins and the Contemporary Leaders, which featured Hampton Hawes, Barney Kessel, Shelly Manne among others. I was pleasantly surprised to find that his recordings with Abbey Lincoln on the album That's Him figured heavily into this collection. You get the album in its entirety, providing a nice change of pace to the hard driving compositions which dominate the five discs. No one played the saxophonist with such force, a true heavyweight, yet he seemed remarkably adaptable to almost any situation. Like other musicians of his day, Rollins became drawn toward eastern music, discovering new techniques, which he nurtured during his hiatus before going onto record with Blue Note and other labels. April 28, 2007

What took me so long?

Sonny Rollins' recordings from '56-'58 are like nothing else. Hard to believe 2 years turned into 5 discs - and he still did 6 dates for Prestige in '56 - no wonder he had to take some time off. The sound, the technique, the concepts, they were sooo hip at the time people are still trying to get it down. This set dispells the myth that Sonny was simply a bebopper. Tracks like "Symphony No. 6", "Freedom Suite", even what he does with "I'm An Old Cowhand" show a man looking to push boundaries. But if you like show tunes and standards, they're here as well, just with the usual Sonny Rollins reinterpretation.
The package is well thought out. Slim and manageable, with great notes & pictures - even suggested reading. Well worth it. August 16, 2006

Beautiful, golden music from the heart

I'm a jazz fan, not a professional reviewer or hardcore jazz nerd, so I won't try to analyze too deeply the details of what makes this music so fantastic. But I love it, and if you like almost any jazz at all there's a pretty good chance you'll dig this. It's incredibly human and lyrical, interesting but accessible, at times challenging without never abrasive, virtuosic but always in the service of music. His long improvisations are full of weight and meaning and never seem to ramble.

Coltrane in full flight is a white-hot supernova of spiritual creative freedom; Rollins at his best is a beautiful intricate golden voice from the heart.

I'm still at the beginning of learning the Rollins canon, which is wonderfully exciting. Every new song I hear deepens my appreciation for this incredible artist. If I could give this box more than 5 stars I would. October 7, 2005

Quintessential Jazz

Listening to this boxed set by Sonny Rollins was like opening up a time portal to the history of Jazz music. This 5 CD set meticulously covers the complete Riverside recordings (1956-58), capturing Rollins in his freelance years. Some jazz experts consider this to be Rollin's most creative period. Many famous and influential artists played with Rollins on these sessions. Here a some of the artists that took part in this musical treasure; Jimmy Cleveland, Wendell Marshall, Oscar Pettiford, Leroy Vinegar, Max Roach, Hampton Hawes, Gil Coggins and Victor Feldman. Every one of these men are considered to be some of the very best musicians of there time period.

I enjoyed disc three and four immensely. The vocals of Abbey Lincoln give the music an ambiance and definitive fifties atmosphere that allows you to step back and put yourself right in that time frame of jazz history. Disc one, two, and five were absolutely amazing as well. When you sit and listen to the developing and flowering talent of the artist it makes you realize why the time period was called the Cool period of jazz.

The music herein can be considered as bop, progressive and contemporary. With the in-depth liner notes and comprehensive coverage of the artists catalog with Riverside, this set leaves no stone unturned. You get a glimpse of the different moods and musical palettes that Rollins draws from to create his music. The free form alternate takes are lengthy musical mirrors of a man that is intent on perfecting his art form. Attempting to push through contemporary barriers to create his own style and trademark, Rollins succeeds in enveloping the other performers in his musical vision. Although his playing seems to be restrained most of the time, the sound could be considered as progressive and slightly risqué for the fifties. It's all labeled as contemporary by today's standards.

When one takes all the factors into consideration, this boxed set stands as a testament to the importance of the artist and his tremendous contributions to music. Sonny Rollins was one of the few saxophone players that was talented enough to set a standard and make his own place in history. This beautiful boxed set is but one piece of a long and storied career. This is a superior chronicle of Sonny Rollin's emergence as a true force in jazz music. There is no doubt that Mr. Rollins should be considered a pioneer and a quintessential part of the jazz genres complex puzzle. This is one piece of the puzzle that has a place amongst the rest to complete the entire musical snapshot of jazz.

Keith Hannaleck May, 4, 2000 MuzikMan's Sound Script July 16, 2000

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