**sonny Rollins - Happy 79th Birthday! Poem by RAJ NANDY

SONNY ROLLINS – HAPPY 79th
BIRTHDAY!
(Br 07 Sep 1930)
Today I sit to pay my homage, to a legend and
Jazz music’s all time great, -
Sonny Rollins the tenor saxophonist, who was
born on this date!
As Theodore Walter ‘Sonny’ Rollins in the year
1930, in New York city!
When Sonny plays the Tenor Sax, decades and
years simply roll back!
The other legendary jazz musicians with whom
he has recorded are, -
Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Max Roache, Art
Blakey; - were all his contemporaries!
Sonny has outlived them all creating jazz history!

Sonny started at the tender age of eleven, playing
with Thelonious Monk on the piano!
Later changed over to alto sax and finally to tenor
sax in 1946,
Thus finding his true vocation taking him to the
forefront of Jazz show!
His first recordings were made in 1949, with Babs
Gonzales the band leader of the Bebop Era, and
also a Beat poet;
Followed by JJ Johnson the trombonist and Bud
Powell the pianist!
In 1950 Rollins got arrested for armed robbery,
But after 10 months - on parole was set free!
Who can change a man’s fate and destiny? !
In his recordings of 1954, Rollins played with
Miles Davis, Charlie Parker and Monk!
Rollins blended the strong sonority of Coleman
Hawkins and Lester Young’s lighter flexibility, -
Which finally inspired his improvisation of the
1950s!
During the fifties he had reached his career’s new
Peak;
His widely acclaimed 'Saxophone Colossus' was
recorded in 1956 in New Jersey!
In 1957 he pioneered the use of bass and drums –
without the piano, -
As accompaniments for his tenor sax solos!
This pattern came to be known as ‘strolling’;
‘Way Out West’ and ‘A Night at the Village
Vanguard’, -were his early such recordings!

Sonny’s first sabbatical was taken in 1959,
When he practiced on the Williamsburg Bridge
New York city all the time!
Only to come back to jazz in 1962 with his best
selling album ‘The Bridge’, -
Which gave Rollins wide acclaim and popularity!
His second sabbatical was taken to study yoga,
meditation and Eastern philosophy!
Making him a complete man as the Creator had
desired him to be!
After his return in 1972, he became enamored by
Pop, Funk, Rhythm and Blues as his passion,
And included the electric bass and guitar with his
Tenor Sax - to set his solos in motion!
But his passion for unaccompanied sax solos kept
growing all the while, -
And so he brought out his first ‘Solo Album’ in
1985!
In 2004 he was awarded the Grammy’s Life Time
Achievement Award, -
And in that year his dear wife Lucille was called up
by The Lord!
With his tenor sax’s brass body, its pearly buttons,
its cane reed and mouth piece bent, -
The Horn becomes the vessel for epic of Rollin’s
un-diminishing talents!
I wish him many more happy returns of this day, -
Truly he is God sent!

-Raj Nandy
07 Sep 09
New Delhi
**Friends I had to compose this Tribute in a hurry
to post it today, being Sonny Rollin’s birthday!
The poem is also dedicated to Bob Blackwell of
South Africa, a true Jazz lover!
Those who want to see him play type -'Sunny Rollins
On You Tube' - to hear him free! Thanks!