Sonny Rollins Saxophone Colossus: An enduring statement as Essential

The loss of one Theodore “Sonny” Rollins on May 25. 2026 marked the end of an era. The legendary musicians who appeared in the classic photo, A Great Day In Harlem, was the only one still living from the grandmasters of the bebop era. It would be inappropriate to say that bebop is a legacy style; as a huge contingent of musicians all over the world still play the music, but all the masters in the grand lineage of jazz as descended from African tradition; the innovators are all gone: Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Dexter Gordon, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Kenny Clarke, Charles Mingus, Roy Haynes– the list goes on.

Rollins, who grew up in the Sugar Hill section of Harlem, was surrounded by giants. Also of Caribbean heritage, he was exposed to calypsos and various other forms, and it provided a rhythmic bedrock he enjoyed. On the same block that he lived, the likes of Max Roach, Coleman Hawkins, his biggest influence, Charlie Parker, Mingus and Miles Davis could all be found in the neighborhood and collaborating– Hawkins bridged the gap between swing and bebop as did many of Rollins’ peers. 

The saxophonist made his first session for Prestige Records in 1949, made his first leader sessions for the label in 1950 and 51, and with Miles Davis, yielded important early music for the trumpeter. Unfortunately, an article discussing Rollins entire career on record would be futile as author Aidan Levy has written a massive, definitive biography I must read. I will discuss Saxophone Colossus critically regarding two pieces of writing I researched by the late critic Ralph J. Gleason. The reason Gleason’s writings are illuminating are because, like most jazz criticism, it stems from the taste of the reviewer, not what is going on in the music itself. I will highlight excerpts from the writings and tackle the argument of why the praise becomes less about Rollins, but more an idea of what jazz drumming should be, according to the reviewer. Gleason’s “praise” turns into a sycophantic idolatry of Max Roach and why his drumming leaves space and not overpowering like Art Blakey or Philly Joe Jones is inappropriate– it should have been For those learning about jazz or in the process of learning and playing, Sonny made some incredible music for the Contemporary, Impulse! and especially Milestone (from 1972-2001) labels which are not explored much in academic settings or really known outside hardcore jazz fans that are also collectors for the most part.

Rollins had an interesting modus operandi in the 1950’s– during the era, musicians had exclusive contracts– Thelonious Monk on Riverside, Miles Davis on Columbia, Charles Mingus on Atlantic, etcetera. The saxophonist employed a unique strategy, following getting clean from a heroin addiction, he recorded for multiple labels as a freelancer, so while he recorded for Prestige, he recorded five albums for Blue Note, The Sound of Sonny and Freedom Suite for Riverside and the classic Way Out West for Contemporary known for pioneering stereo recordings in jazz. 

On June 22, 1956 in Rudy Van Gelder’s Hackensack, NJ studio (the legendary engineer’s parents’ living room) he fronted a quartet with recent Detroit arrivals, pianist Tommy Flanagan, current Jazz Messenger Doug Watkins on bass, and Max Roach. The session resulted in one of the definitive masterpieces in jazz, but also the entire catalog of the reedman; Saxophone Colossus.

Saxophone Colossus, his sixth album as a leader, demonstrates the core qualities that make him great: Rollins was a master of motivic development, a peerless command of the American songbook enabled him to spin endless variations in his improvisations, alongside his harmonic acuity. The title track opens with Max Roach playing a bouncy, swinging calypso rhythm that almost sashays. The tune is classic rhythm changes, but what follows is one of the greatest and most notable jazz solos of all time. The saxophonist with his big throated tone, taking the tiniest melodic morsel and just runs with it, the well never runs dry, then Roach takes a similar melodic turn on drums, the common bop vocabulary phrases that Art Blakey and others also use. Ralph Gleason’s 5 star Downbeat review from June 27, 1957 sums the album perfectly, however we find in his San Francisco Chronicle periodical from June 6th, 1957, he is contradictory in his assessment of drummers. First, we’ll look at his Downbeat review:

Almost as if in answer to the charge that there is a lack of grace and beauty in the work of the New York hard-swingers comes this album in which Rollins displays humor, gentleness, a delicate feeling for beauty in line, and a puckish sense of humor. And all done with the uncompromising swinging that has characterized them all along.

The treatment of Moritat, for instance, or Blue Seven, show Rollins in particularly interesting statements and restatements of ideas. The latter tune is an especially compelling work. From the fascinating bass introduction, through the discontinuity of Sonny’s first chorus, the piano solo, the duet between Sonny and Max, on through the rest of the piece till the final fade out – it is all modern jazz of the first rank.

Rollins’ playing on the slow ballad, You Don’t Know What Love Is was a moving experience for me to hear. A gentle, easy, careful man – rather like a giant male nurse handling a particularly angry wound.

Roach continues to be head and shoulders above every drummer in his musical conception of a drum solo, in his exploration of the potentialities of the instrument, and his unfailing good taste in the use of the sounds and combinations of sounds his explorations produce.

It seems very unclear on what he means by the “lack of grace and beauty in the work of New Jazz Swingers”. Is he referring to the high speed flights of Lee Morgan, the moodiness of Kenny Dorham, the harmonic fancy of Hank Mobley, criticisms of Jackie McLean and John Jenkins as Bird clones (the dismissive review of the now classic blowing session Alto Madness also on the Jazz Tome website is quite funny– was Gleason’s ire piqued at the tendency for many up and medium up tempos? One can only surmise. At this point in 1956, so called hard bop was in full, pun intended swing– and Rollins melody with its use of funky blues cliches, and a considered solo from the earth, on “Strode Rode”. “Strode Rode” could be thought of as a stylistically signature hard bop tone. Tommy Flanagan, on early sessions, both as a leader and sideman, proves to be funkier than his later more lauded playing would indicate. A harbinger of the harmonic freedom to come on dates like A Night At the Village Vanguard, the reedist digs in with his thick Coleman Hawkins tone, and his playing with just Watkins behind him before Roach comes  charging out at the gate, is magical. Gleason’s review isn’t really about Rollins as much as it is overblown praise of Max Roach and what he thinks the role of a drummer should be. It’s standard practice for critics to be dismissive of aspects of the music as the drumming, or completely wrong about technical aspects. For a recent example, the jazz and audiophile critic Ken Micallef interviewed Lenny White on his involvement on Woody Shaw’s 1970 landmark Blackstone Legacy, and at one point, the legendary White schools Micallef on rhythms, because the writer; a former semi professional drummer told White what he thought– the drummer was doing– which makes critical analysis null and void. A future article will discuss legendary jazz drummers and how jazz drumming has its roots in West Africa, other areas of the continent as well as Latin, Central and South America. 

Below in his San Francisco Chronicle treatise Which Way Today’s Jazz Drummer from earlier in 1957 on June 6th, his bias for Roach is clear while discussing a concise history of drummers. That despite being one of the biggest names in jazz criticism at the time, should immediately have disqualified him from credibility in his review: too often in jazz criticism, rather than speaking on the music itself, the reviewer makes it about their own taste. Gleason’s line in discussing the standard “You Don’t Know What Love Is” is quite strange as well.

Rollins’ playing on the slow ballad, You Don’t Know What Love Is was a moving experience for me to hear. A gentle, easy, careful man – rather like a giant male nurse handling a particularly angry wound.

Gleason’s review demonstrates problems that writers as influential as they were, like Leonard Feather and Ira Gitler, who definitely had a huge formative influence on my writing– their critical pieces, as well as liners– take Feather’s pseudo clever opening musings on Kenny Burrell’s Midnight Blue or Ira Gitler’s endless baseball analogies on Phil Woods’ 1955 Prestige debut Woodlore have too much “them” and not enough about the music. As I noted in my Medium article on The Problem with Jazz Critics #2: Jimmy Smith and The Hammond Organ– The Red Headed Stepchild of Jazz I wrote regarding effusive critical praise:

Gitler, like Leonard Feather, (whom embarrassingly goes to endless lengths in his liners to A New Sound, A New Star, Volume 2 to make the case Smith is a modernist), sings the praises of the organist though in a much more refined manner than vocalist Babs Gonzales’ absurd notes to the first volume. Gonzales used hipster slang of the era to frame his self congratulatory satisfaction at finding and managing Smith. The organist who had a grandiose opinion of himself, which made for incredibly entertaining interviews, refuted once that Gonzales was even his manager, claiming to have knocked him out at a recording session for what I can only gather were managerial issues! 

Feather would get a bit too technical for the average reader in hundreds of album notes, and essays, as have more contemporary self important writers like All Music Guide writer Thom Jurek, who gets so caught up in theoretical word salad, the reader forgets why they looked up a review for information in the first place. Modern award winning writers like Nate Chinen and pianist Ethan Iverson often get too poetic at points but to be fair, Mr. Iverson dives deep into the music in a manner few would and his exhaustive essays are awesome for that reason. Then there is the subject of jazz writers pushing their own agenda as the late Stanley Crouch (google any piece of writing on the Marsalis’ brothers or diatribes on Miles Davis’ electric period). 

Returning to Gleason’s review. The experience of being lost in a reverie itself is beautiful, as is “A Gentle, easy careful man–” but in these times, the description of a male nurse in the current era is quite antiquated– in the fifties it may not have been so because in the Eisenhower era, gender roles were strictly defined, and until the Women’s Liberation and civil rights movement would change actually come. Saxophone Colossus is a definitive early recording but it’s mixed in with a bevy of incredible music the saxophonist recorded with Miles, Monk. Sonny Rollins Vol 1, Sonny Rollins Volume 2, Newk’s Time, work with the Modern Jazz Quartet. The self imposed sabbatical until 1962 on the Williamsburg Bridge, resulting in the album The Bridge, demonstrated an increase in technique and harmonic vocabulary which would stretch even further into the 70’s and beyond. Albums such as Next Album, Horn Culture and The Solo Album where he’d experiment even further, even playing soprano sax, an instrument for which he is not well known, would broaden the palette. Saxophone Colossus remains a vital study and pleasurable experience of a masterful improviser. However Gleason’s usage of Saxophone Colossus as a facade to exalt Max Roach, shows little understanding of the triumph of Rollins’ improvisational fervor, something that would define the rest of his career.