SAXOPHONE COLOSSUS by AIDAN LEVY (Hachette Books) (2022): Sonny Rollins and Thelonius Monk: the High Priest of Jazz

Sonny Rollins first heard Monk on the B-side of Coleman Hawkins’ ‘Drifting on a Reed’ b/w Monk’s ‘Flyin’ Hawk’ – “staccato accents to Hawk’s lyrical vibrato; a dissonant counterpoint” connecting the stride piano tradition exemplified by James P. Johnson to “the sweeping improvisational vision of Art Tatum” (p 77).

Sonny was 16 when he caught the ear of Monk who taught him about “the geometry of musical time and space”, but not in a didactic way. Others thought harmonically and based their music on blues chords but Monk made up his own chords and melodies. As an aside Monk had a 1939 portrait of Billie Holiday, flower canted in her hair in his apartment and as I look behind me, I see the portrait he is referring to framed on the wall of my writing room. “Monk epitomised the sound of surprise” (p 81). Although Monk’s technique might be considered unorthodox, he knew the American songbook inside out.

Sonny developed an original style focusing on melody with “rhythmic angularity to staccato to fine threads” (p 82). We are told on page 84 that he was a big union man and proud of it, joining the American Federation of Musicians and becoming a professional musician at sixteen, to quickly emerge as one of the ‘Counts of Bop’.

I realise this is a book about Sonny Rollins but of all of the afore written shows the deep contextual narrative in Aidan Levy’s book which is a must for all serious jazz lovers. It is also available on Amazon Kindle.