Sonny Rollins: 12 Essential Albums

 

 

The towering saxophonist, who died at 95, was a master of living in the moment. Listen to some of his most compelling work, onstage and in the studio. 

"Sonny Rollins’s contribution to jazz can be hard to sum up easily. The saxophone great, who died Monday at 95, didn’t spearhead new movements, like Charlie Parker or Miles Davis; establish a unique compositional universe, like Thelonious Monk or Wayne Shorter; or lead an iconic working band, like John Coltrane or Duke Ellington. But what Rollins unquestionably did do, across his roughly 65-year career, is commit himself to the genre’s core imperative: inventing in real time, brilliantly and indefatigably."

listen to selection by Hank Shteamer