Rollins' 60's work

[WD45]

  MartyJazz said:

OUR MAN IN JAZZ (RCA Victor), a live date at the Village Gate with Don Cherry, Rollins at this most "out" and tremendously inspired alongside Don Cherry (available on the RCA boxed set)

I wish RCA had a stable reissue program that would let this one see the light of day on its own outside of the box...

[Guest akanalog]

"the bridge" always seemed a bit of a bore to me too.

for some reason the impulse quartet album has been an album i return to a lot, though i do not care for "alfie" or "east bway rundown". i am a big fan of mickey roker, the drummer on the quartet album, and ray bryant is an artist i would like to hear more of.

the stuff with don cherry is great, in my opinion.

all the live rollins i have heard from the 60s has been excellent except perhaps that poorly recorded impulse date with two drummers.

as a matter of fact...

just recently on etree, someone posted an mpeg of rollins, cherry, grimes and higgins doing a song on a tv broadcast. brief and black and white but very cool to see.

[Chuck Nessa]

  WD45 said:

I wish RCA had a stable reissue program that would let this one see the light of day on its own outside of the box...

You won't see anything different 'til he dies and they can go against his wishes.

[Late]

  WD45 said:

  MartyJazz said:

OUR MAN IN JAZZ (RCA Victor), a live date at the Village Gate with Don Cherry, Rollins at this most "out" and tremendously inspired alongside Don Cherry (available on the RCA boxed set)

I wish RCA had a stable reissue program that would let this one see the light of day on its own outside of the box...

BMG Japan reissued this one individually in mini-LP format. Great sound (the horns are crystal clear), original cover art and notes, but no bonus tracks. The catalog number is BVCJ 37211. Worth searching out if you're a fan of the album.

[Д.Д.]

  WD45 said:

  MartyJazz said:

OUR MAN IN JAZZ (RCA Victor), a live date at the Village Gate with Don Cherry, Rollins at this most "out" and tremendously inspired alongside Don Cherry (available on the RCA boxed set)

I wish RCA had a stable reissue program that would let this one see the light of day on its own outside of the box...

Available as French BMG digipak reissue; 24-bit remastering.

[Late]

Here's how my disography lists the Tokyo show:

Sonny Rollins: tenor saxophone

Rashied Ali: trumpet

Paul Bley: piano

Henry Grimes: bass

Roy McCurdy: drums

Marounuchi Hotel, Tokyo

September 19, 1963

1. Mack the Knife (21:51)

2. Oleo (22:21)

Rollins: tenor saxophone

Tetsuo Fushimi: trumpet

Akira Miyazawa: tenor saxophone

Novio Maeda: piano

Tatsuro Takimoto: bass

Takeshi Inomate: drums

3. On a Slow Boat to China (4:50)

I have three listings for Half Note shows:

Sonny Rollins: tenor saxophone

Herbie Hancock: piano

Herman Wright: bass

Beaver Harris: drums

Half Note Café, New York City

April 30, 1965 radio broadcast

1. There Will Never Be Another You (15:30)

2. My One and Only Love (6:25)

3. Three Little Words (4:30)

*

Sonny Rollins: tenor saxophone

Walter Booker: bass

Frankie Dunlop: drums

Half Note Café, New York City

January 14, 1966 radio broadcast

1. Three Little Words (9:05)

*

Sonny Rollins: tenor saxophone

McCoy Tyner: piano

Walter Booker: bass

Mickey Roker: drums

Half Note Café, New York City

February 11, 1966 television broadcast

1. Medley (24:40) (Without a Song - Everytime We Say Goodbye - Four - Night and Day)

A television broadcast?! And, in Tokyo, is that the same Rashied Ali we know as a drummer?

[Leeway]

It seems that the consensus is that anything after 1968 is either iffy or just plain .

Frankly, I agree with that. But I'd be interested in hearing why the 70s and later work is deemed inferior or deficient. Does the problem lie with Sonny's playing? His musical conceptions? The material? Or the sidemen he has chosen?

[JSngry]

  Leeway said:

It seems that the consensus is that anything after 1968 is either iffy or just plain .

Not my consensus at all. There are any number of gems. Just not entire albums worth, usually. Oh well.

I think I've been in cyberjazzland too long. This is the umpteenth time that this subject has come up, and I'm out of anything new to say.

[Late]

  JSngry said:

  Leeway said:

It seems that the consensus is that anything after 1968 is either iffy or just plain  .

There are any number of gems. Just not entire albums worth, usually. Oh well.

I think those few words sum it up pretty much.

I still feel like I don't "know" Rollins' 70's work to the present very well, but there are always some gems to be found/heard from the recordings of the "later" years. G-Man is much fun, Newk's cover of "Tennessee Waltz" ...

I can't say, however, that I'm much inspired by his bands from later decades.

[BFrank]

I was pretty happy to pick up a print of the Francis Wolff photo used on the "Newks Time" cover from Mosaic (on sale!) recently. It's an 8x10 image that's shows the entire sax and some of the surrounding studio (living room). That cover is cropped pretty tight.

[MartyJazz]

  Late said:

Anyone have any tapes/recordings of Newk's 1963 Tokyo concert? Or the 1965 Half Note concert? Or any other grey market stuff? I have most (but certainly not all) of the "standard" European live recordings from this time, but am always on the lookout for new sounds from this period (1962-68). You can always PM me!

I do have the April '65 Half Note broadcast. Fantastic! A terrific opening "There Will Never be Another You", a ballad, then a closing "Three Little Words" in which host Alan Grant has to cut in to end the show due to time constraints. Whenever I hear Sonny wailing on that piece, I keep hoping that Grant will somehow not interrupt.

P.S. You will be PM'd.

[Late]

  MartyJazz said:

I do have the April '65 Half Note broadcast. Fantastic! A terrific opening "There Will Never be Another You", a ballad, then a closing "Three Little Words" in which host Alan Grant has to cut in to end the show due to time constraints. Whenever I hear Sonny wailing on that piece, I keep hoping that Grant will somehow not interrupt.

So you have the show with Hancock? Maybe David heard another show (with Bryant). And then ... McCoy was on for another gig later on. I wonder why Sonny went back to using a piano around this time? To me, it doesn't really sound like he needed one.

(Still having a hard time believing that the one '66 Half Note show was broadcast for television. Maybe it's a typo in my discography.)

This entry looks interesting ...

Sonny Rollins: tenor saxophone — practicing, in conversation with Paul Jeffrey, and playing with Charles Moffett's youth orchestra in New York. Autumn, 1967.

Documentary: Sonny Rollins — Musician (30 minutes)

directed by Dick Fontaine

[Stereojack]

As a long time Sonny fan, I just gotta throw my two cents worth in here. I love "The Bridge", "What's New" (an overlooked masterpiece, IMO. The long "If Ever I Would Leave You" is priceless), "Sonny Meets Hawk", "On Impulse", and "Alfie" (again, overlooked - Sonny plays his ass off).

A lot of people point to "Our Man In Jazz", but I think it's just a little too rambling. "Now's the Time" & ""Standard" are OK, but seem too edited for airplay, and don't flow particularly.

I loved his first "comeback" album on Milestone, but it's been downhill ever since. I finally gave up on his records by the mid 1980's, although they weren't as lame as a couple of out-and-out commercial titles he spewed out in the mid 70's.

[Guest akanalog]

i like electric jazz and some fusion but i think rollins milestone albums are pretty lame. the mid to late 70s stuff is not funky or groovy and the early 70s stuff isnt deep enough. some of "horn culture" gets there but it isn't a great album. some of "nucleus" is ok funk, but not enough. and the song harlem boys off of "don't ask" is awesome but the album has some lame lyricon on it too. the albums never sound like a real band-just rollins in front of different settings. i guess he was bigger than these other musicians he was playing with, but joe henderson, for instance, has some nice 70s milestone albums where it seems like he is nicely integrated into the situations.

one question-what happened to david lee? haven't seen him on anything much else besides rollins milestone work. i think he was with roy ayers a bit too. not sure.

i did see some rollins CD on jvc perhaps from the 70s recently that i have never seen before. it was live in japan and had lee on it. anyone hear this before?

[MartyJazz]

  akanalog said:

one question-what happened to david lee? haven't seen him on anything much else besides rollins milestone work. i think he was with roy ayers a bit too. not sure.

i did see some rollins CD on jvc perhaps from the 70s recently that i have never seen before. it was live in japan and had lee on it. anyone hear this before?

Between 1972 and '73, I saw Rollins several times at the Vanguard and Half Note in a quartet that included Albert Dailey, Larry Ridley and David Lee. Some of the greatest live jazz I've ever witnessed and that's saying alot. As for David Lee, he surely did disappear.

I do have the JVC Tokyo date on LP. Since his live dates well into the early '90s could be terrific depending on when and where one caught Sonny, I had great hopes when I picked up this album some 30 years ago. And while Richard Palmer lauds it in his book on Sonny Rollins, I too am of the opinion that Rollins recordings post 1968 are just not as gripping or on the same level as previous recorded work, sad to say.

[sidewinder]

  Late said:

This entry looks interesting ...

Sonny Rollins: tenor saxophone — practicing, in conversation with Paul Jeffrey, and playing with Charles Moffett's youth orchestra in New York. Autumn, 1967.

Documentary: Sonny Rollins — Musician (30 minutes)

directed by Dick Fontaine

I have this one on a video. Most of it concentrates on Rollins practicing on that railway bridge in NYC, along with Paul Jeffrey. There's also footage of that school band rehearsal where Rollins sits in and gives a bit of tuition. At first I thought the teacher might have been Ken McIntyre (looks like him) but the guy plays trumpet so it obviously isn't. The film has a 'Rhapsody Films' credit so may be on their recent batch of releases.

From the video evidence of the playing, Rollins definitely 'had it' as of late 1967.

There's also that incredible video of him at Ronnie Scotts where he turns up at the club entrance emerging from a taxi and playing the tenor cadenza, walks through the entrance and onto the stage, somehow synchronising with the band has he does so. Haven't seen that film for years, last time was on some TV show. Must have been recorded late 60s/early 70s.

Edited January 27, 2005 by sidewinder

[AllenLowe]

there are many problems with his late recordings - first, Tommy Campbell, the drummer, sucks, is way too loud; the electric bass dominates the group. The ironic thing is that Sonny, at one time, was working to unclutter the rhythm section; the late groups are nothing but clutter. Also, I hate the sound of the albums; Sonny started using that clip-on microphone, which is incredibly un-natural sounding. And most of the studio albums were mixed terribly, and sound like they were recorded with complete isolation. Sonny sounds like he phoned it in, and everything is equallly loud, as though they were fantasizing they might get some commercial air play. Sad stuff -

Edited January 27, 2005 by AllenLowe

[JSngry]

  AllenLowe said:

Sonny started using that clip-on microphone, which is incredibly un-natural sounding.

Yeah, and you can hear the pad noise from inside the horn, too, which is wierd as hell.

BUT -

That's when the playing on the albums started getting better, when he was free to move around.

[AllenLowe]

true, but it sounded like he was playing in the parkling lot -

[JSngry]

Guess the parking lot is where you go when you get too old for the bridge.

[AllenLowe]

well put!

[PHILLYQ]

  MartyJazz said:

  akanalog said:

one question-what happened to david lee?  haven't seen him on anything much else besides rollins milestone work.  i think he was with roy ayers a bit too.  not sure.

i did see some rollins CD on jvc perhaps from the 70s recently that i have never seen before.  it was live in japan and had lee on it.  anyone hear this before?

Between 1972 and '73, I saw Rollins several times at the Vanguard and Half Note in a quartet that included Albert Dailey, Larry Ridley and David Lee. Some of the greatest live jazz I've ever witnessed and that's saying alot. As for David Lee, he surely did disappear.

I do have the JVC Tokyo date on LP. Since his live dates well into the early '90s could be terrific depending on when and where one caught Sonny, I had great hopes when I picked up this album some 30 years ago. And while Richard Palmer lauds it in his book on Sonny Rollins, I too am of the opinion that Rollins recordings post 1968 are just not as gripping or on the same level as previous recorded work, sad to say.

In '74(?) I saw Sonny at the Vanguard a bunch of times with David Lee, Rufus Harley(saxophone & bagpipes), Yoshiaki Masuo(guitar), Mtume, Stanley Cowell & Bob Cranshaw. I was fairly new to jazz then and it twisted my head around until it popped! He was making magic live, even if he was producing humdrum recordings. That band did record one disc together, 'The Cutting Edge', which if I recall had some nice moments on it.

[Guest akanalog]

not a big fan of "the cutting edge". maybe too many ballads which i don't think were the strength of this kind of band. the ending jam with harley on bagpipes is fun though.

whitney balliet seems to be a huge fan of david lee's work. that is one thing i remember from reasing balliet's writing.

[JSngry]

David Lee plays/played cymbals the way they were meant to be played.