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Get it between 2025-03-04 to 2025-03-11. Additional 3 business days for provincial shipping.
ROLLINS SONNY
JAZZ
INTERNATIONAL
MUSIC
Amazon.com In 1957, Sonny Rollins was at an early creative peak, already a masterful improviser who could range from hard-bitten bop blues to broad or sly humor, all conveyed with a swaggering virtuosity and bullying warmth. One of the first jazz musicians to develop the extended solo, Rollins would turn tunes inside out rhythmically, often building a solo around complex variations on a tune's melody. The Vanguard recordings come from a period when Rollins found maximum freedom in a trio pared down to the essentials of tenor, bass, and drums, and the multiple takes here testify to his fluent invention. Disc 1 of this set is highlighted by two takes of "A Night in Tunisia," the first recorded at a matinee with bassist Donald Bailey and drummer Pete LaRoca, the second and faster version at the evening performance with regular accompanists bassist Wilbur Ware and drummer Elvin Jones. The second CD continues the evening performance with Ware and Jones. It's a uniquely gifted threesome, with each musician seeming to invent new ways to swing, without a note or a musical opportunity wasted. Both Rollins and Ware reveal their relationship to Thelonious Monk in the ability to create complex, arresting music out of shifts in rhythmic inflections. It's especially apparent in the second version of "Softly as in a Morning Sunrise." In this context, Jones has an opportunity to show just how melodic a drummer he was. The two versions of "Get Happy" demonstrate Rollins's ability to make complex and witty music out of the most banal material, while "What Is This Thing Called Love" is a tour de force of sustained group invention. --Stuart Broomer Product Description The mid-fifties was an astonishing period for this saxophone genius. And for all his great work in this era, this daring album and "Saxophone Colossus" remain his crowning achievements. With just bass (Wilbur Ware) and drums (Elvin Jones) in support, Rollins creates tenor saxophone improvisations of increible beauty and inexhaustible creativity. Twenty years after the initial album, a double album containing the rest of the releasable material from this magic night at the Village Vanguard was issued. With the recent re-discovery of the original tapes, the performance has been assembled as it happened and beautifully remastered by original engineer with superb depth of sound. Several of Sonny's stage announcements have been added to master for the first time.