sign in sign up
<<
Home , Bob Cranshaw, Edward MacDowell Medal, Next Album, Saxophone Colossus, Sonny Rollins

CAL PERFORMANCES PRESENTS

Thursday, May 13, 2010, 8pm Zellerbach Hall

Sonny Rollins tenor guitar bass Kobie Watkins drums Victor Y. See-Yuen percussion

This presentation is made possible, in part, by Patron Sponsors Maris and Ivan Meyerson.

Cal Performances’ 2009–2010 season is sponsored by Wells Fargo.

CAL PERFORMANCES 29 ABOUT THE ARTIST ABOUT THE ARTIST

h e o d o r e w a l t e r “s o n n y ” r o l l i n s was end of 1955 as a member of the - By the mid-, his live sets became grand, He won his first performance Grammy Award Tborn on September 7, 1930, in New York Quintet, with an even more authori- marathon stream-of-consciousness solos where he for This Is What I Do (2000), and his second for City. He grew up in not far from the Savoy tative presence. His trademarks became a caus- would call forth melodies from his encyclopedic 2004’s (The 9/11 Concert), in the Ballroom, the Apollo Theater and the doorstep of tic, often humorous style of melodic invention, knowledge of popular songs, including startling Best Instrumental Solo category (for “Why his idol, . After his early discov- a command of everything from the most arcane segues and sometimes barely visiting one theme be- Was I Born”). In addition, Mr. Rollins received a ery of Fats Waller and , he started ballads to calypsos, and an overriding logic in fore surging into dazzling variations upon the next. Lifetime Achievement Award from the National playing , inspired by . his playing that found him hailed for models of Mr. Rollins was brilliant, yet restless. The period Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences in 2004. At age 16, he switched to tenor, trying to emulate thematic improvisation. between 1962 and 1966 saw him returning to ac- In June 2006, Mr. Rollins was inducted into Hawkins. He also fell under the spell of the musi- In 1956, Mr. Rollins began recording the first tion and striking productive relationships with Jim the Academy of Achievement—and gave a solo cal revolution that surrounded him, . of a series of landmark recordings issued under Hall, , and his idol, Coleman performance—at the International Achievement He began to follow , and soon his own name: “Valse Hot” introduced the prac- Hawkins, yet he grew dissatisfied with the music Summit in . The event was hosted by came under the wing of , who tice, now common, of playing bop in 3/4 meter; business once again and started yet another sab- and Steven Spielberg and attended became his musical mentor and guru. Living in “St. Thomas” initiated his explorations of calypso batical in 1966. “I was getting into Eastern reli- by world leaders and distinguished figures in the Sugar Hill, his neighborhood musical peers in- patterns; and “Blue 7” was hailed by Gunther gions,” he remembers. “I’ve always been my own arts and sciences. cluded Jackie McLean, and Arthur Schuller as demonstrating a new manner of “the- man. I’ve always done, tried to do, what I wanted Mr. Rollins was awarded the Austrian Cross Taylor, but it was young Mr. Rollins who was first matic improvisation,” in which the soloist develops to do for myself. So these are things I wanted to do. of Honor for Science and Art, First Class, in out of the pack, working and recording with Babs motifs extracted from his theme. Way Out West I wanted to go on the bridge. I wanted to get into November 2009. The award is one of Austria’s Gonzales, J. J. Johnson, and Miles (1957), Mr. Rollins’s first using a trio of sax- religion. But also, the jazz music business is always highest honors, given to leading international fig- Davis before he turned 20. ophone, , and drums, offered a solution bad. It’s never good. So that led me to stop play- ures for distinguished achievement. The only other “Of course, these people are there to be called to his longstanding difficulties with incompatible ing in public for a while, again. During the second American artists who have received this recogni- on because I think I represent them in a way,” pianists, and exemplified his witty ability to im- sabbatical, I worked in Japan a little bit, and went tion are and Jessye Norman. Mr. Rollins said recently of his peers and mentors. provise on hackneyed material (“Wagon Wheels,” to India after that and spent a lot of time in a mon- In August 2010, the MacDowell Colony, the “They’re not here now so I feel like I’m sort of rep- “I’m an Old Cowhand”). It Could Happen to You astery. I resurfaced in the early ’70s, and made my ’ leading artist residency program, resenting all of them, all of the guys. Remember, (also 1957) was the first in a long series of unac- first record in 1972. I took some time off to get will present its 51st Edward MacDowell Medal to I’m one of the last guys left, as I’m constantly being companied solo recordings, and The Freedom Suite myself together and I think it’s a good thing for Sonny Rollins. The MacDowell Medal has been told, so I feel a holy obligation sometimes to evoke (1958) foreshadowed the political stances taken in anybody to do.” awarded annually since 1960 to an individual these people.” jazz in the 1960s. From 1956 to 1958, Mr. Rollins In 1972, with the encouragement and sup- who has made an outstanding contribution to his In the early 1950s, he established a reputa- was widely regarded as the most talented and in- port of his wife Lucille, who had become his or her field, and this year marks the first time the tion first among musicians, then the public, as novative tenor saxophonist in jazz. business manager, Mr. Rollins returned to per- Colony has recognized the field of jazz. Mr. Rollins the most brash and creative young tenor on the Mr. Rollins’s first examples of the unaccom- forming and recording, signing with Milestone joins an impressive list of past recipients, including scene, through his work with Miles, Monk and the panied solo playing that would become a specialty and releasing . (Working at first with , Alice Munro, I. M. Pei, Merce . also appeared in this period; yet the perpetually , by the early 1980s Mr. Rollins Cunningham and Georgia O’Keeffe. was an early Sonny Rollins fan, dissatisfied saxophonist questioned the acclaim his was producing his own Milestone sessions with “I am convinced that all art has the desire to and in his autobiography wrote that he “began to music was attracting, and between 1959 and late Lucille.) His lengthy association with the Berkeley- leave the ordinary,” Mr. Rollins said in a recent in- hang out with Sonny Rollins and his Sugar Hill 1961 withdrew from public performance. based label produced two dozen in vari- terview for the Catalan magazine Jaç, “and to say it Harlem crowd...anyway, Sonny had a big repu- Mr. Rollins remembers that he took his leave of ous settings—from his working groups to all-star one way, at a spiritual level, a state of the exaltation tation among a lot of the younger musicians in absence from the scene because “I was getting very ensembles (, Jack DeJohnette, at existence. All art has this in common. But jazz, Harlem. People loved Sonny Rollins up in Harlem famous at the time and I felt I needed to brush up Stanley Clarke, ); from a solo recital the world of improvisation, is perhaps the highest, and everywhere else. He was a legend, almost a god on various aspects of my craft. I felt I was getting to tour recordings with the Milestone Jazzstars because we do not have the opportunity to make to a lot of the younger musicians. Some thought too much, too soon, so I said, wait a minute, I’m (, McCoy Tyner); in the studio and on changes. It’s as if we were painting before the pub- he was playing the saxophone on the level of Bird. going to do it my way. I wasn’t going to let people the concert stage (Montreux, San Francisco, New lic, and the following morning we cannot go back I know one thing—he was close. He was an ag- push me out there, so I could fall down. I wanted to York, ). Mr. Rollins was also the subject of a and correct that blue color or change that red. We gressive, innovative player who always had fresh get myself together, on my own. I used to practice mid-1980s documentary by Robert Mugge entitled have to have the blues and reds very well placed musical ideas.” on the bridge, the Williamsburg Bridge, because I ; part of its soundtrack was re- before going out to play. So for me, jazz is probably Mr. Rollins moved to for a few years was living on the at the time.” leased on CD as G-Man. the most demanding art.” to remove himself from the elements of negativity When he returned to action in early 1962, his surrounding the jazz scene. He reemerged at the first recording was appropriately titled The Bridge.

30 CAL PERFORMANCES CAL PERFORMANCES 31