Saxophone Colossus
{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2025}}
{{Infobox album
| name = Saxophone Colossus
| type = Album
| artist = Sonny Rollins
| cover = Saxophone Colossus - Sonny Rollins.jpg
| alt =
| released = March/April 1957{{cite magazine|title=SINGLES & ALBUMS RELEASED - For period March 16 thru July |journal=The Billboard |date=August 19, 1957 |pages=36, 60 |url=https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/50s/1957/Billboard%201957-08-19.pdf |access-date=April 11, 2019|via=americanradiohistory.com}}{{cite journal |title=Special Merit Jazz Album |journal=The Billboard |date=April 27, 1957 |page=29 |url=https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/50s/1957/Billboard%201957-04-27.pdf |access-date=April 11, 2019|via=americanradiohistory.com}}
| recorded = June 22, 1956
| venue =
| studio = Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, New Jersey
| genre = Hard bop{{cite book|last=Rosenthal|first=David H.|chapter=Selected Hard Bop Discography|page=193|title=Hard Bop: Jazz and Black Music 1955-1965|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1993|isbn=0195358996}}
| length = 39:58
| label = Prestige
| producer = Bob Weinstock
| prev_title = Tenor Madness
| prev_year = 1956
| next_title = Rollins Plays for Bird
| next_year = 1956
}}
Saxophone Colossus is the sixth studio album by American jazz saxophonist Sonny Rollins. Perhaps Rollins's best-known album, it is often considered his breakthrough record.{{Cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/2011/06/20/4181980/sonny-rollins-saxophone-colossus|title = Sonny Rollins: 'Saxophone Colossus'|newspaper = NPR.org}} It was recorded monophonically on June 22, 1956, with producer Bob Weinstock and engineer Rudy Van Gelder at the latter's studio in Hackensack, New Jersey. Rollins led a quartet on the album that included pianist Tommy Flanagan, bassist Doug Watkins, and drummer Max Roach. Rollins was a member of the Clifford Brown/Max Roach Quintet at the time of the recording, and the recording took place four days before his bandmates Brown and Richie Powell died in a car accident on the way to a band engagement in Chicago (Rollins was not travelling in the car carrying Brown and Powell). Roach appeared on several more of Rollins' solo albums, up to the 1958 Freedom Suite album.
Saxophone Colossus was released by Prestige Records to critical success and helped establish Rollins as a prominent jazz artist.{{cite book|author=Anon.|year=2007|chapter=Sonny Rollins - Saxophone Colossus|page=13|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AVQbF9lTBwgC&pg=PA13|title=The Mojo Collection|edition=4th|access-date=November 15, 2015|publisher=Canongate Books|isbn=978-1847676436}}
In 2016, Saxophone Colossus was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".{{cite web | url=https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-17-029/ | title=National Recording Registry Picks Are "Over the Rainbow" | work=Library of Congress | date=March 29, 2016 | access-date=March 29, 2016}}
Release and legacy
{{Music ratings
| rev1 = AllMusic
| rev2 = Disc
| rev2score = {{rating|5|5}}{{cite magazine |title=Reviews |last=Hall |first=Tony |author-link=Tony Hall (music executive) |magazine=Disc |date=28 June 1958 |issue=21 |page=15}}
| rev3 = DownBeat
| rev3Score = {{Rating|5|5}}{{cite journal|last=Gleason|first=Ralph J.|author-link=Ralph J. Gleason|date=June 27, 1957|url=http://downbeat.com/microsites/prestige/sonny-review-colossus.html|title=Saxophone Colossus|journal=Down Beat|location=Chicago|access-date=November 15, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140807221612/http://downbeat.com/microsites/prestige/sonny-review-colossus.html|archive-date=August 7, 2014}}
| rev4 = Encyclopedia of Popular Music
| rev4Score = {{Rating|5|5}}{{cite book|last=Larkin|first=Colin|author-link=Colin Larkin|title=Encyclopedia of Popular Music|year=2007|publisher=Oxford University Press|edition=4th|isbn=978-0195313734|title-link=Encyclopedia of Popular Music}}
| rev5 = Jazzwise
| rev5score = {{Rating|5|5}}{{cite web |title=Sonny Rollins – Saxophone Colossus ★★★★★ |url=https://www.jazzwise.com/review/article/sonny-rollins-saxophone-colossus |website=Jazzwise |access-date=30 July 2020 |language=en |date=July 22, 2019}}
| rev6 = MusicHound Jazz
| rev7 = The Penguin Guide to Jazz
| rev7Score = {{Rating|4|4}} 👑Cook, Richard and Brian Morton (2008), The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings (ninth ed.) Penguin, p. 1233.
| rev8 = Record Mirror
| rev8Score = {{Rating|3|5}}{{Cite magazine |last1=Jones |first1=Peter |author-link1=Peter Jones (journalist) |last2= Jopling |first2= Norman |date=19 February 1966 |title=Sonny Rollins: Saxophone Colossus |url=https://worldradiohistory.com/UK/Record-Mirror/60s/66/Record-Mirror-1966-02-19.pdf |magazine=Record Mirror |issue=258 |page=8 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220401225635/https://worldradiohistory.com/UK/Record-Mirror/60s/66/Record-Mirror-1966-02-19.pdf |archive-date=1 April 2022|access-date=22 August 2022}}
| rev9 = The Rolling Stone Album Guide
| rev9Score = {{Rating|4|5}}{{cite book|last1=Moon|first1=Tom|chapter=Sonny Rollins|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t9eocwUfoSoC&pg=PA699|title=The Rolling Stone Album Guide|year=2004|page=[https://archive.org/details/newrollingstonea00brac/page/699 699]|editor1-last=Brackett|editor1-first=Nathan|editor2-last=Hoard|editor2-first=Christian|access-date=November 15, 2015|publisher=Simon & Schuster|isbn=0743201698}}
| rev10 = The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide
| rev10Score = {{rating|5|5}}{{Cite book |editor-last=Swenson |editor-first=J. | year = 1985 | title = The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide | publisher = Random House/Rolling Stone | location = USA | isbn = 0-394-72643-X | pages = 171}}
}}
Independent sources have differed in their reporting of the album's release date. According to The Mojo Collection, it was released in the autumn of 1956, while an August 1957 issue of Billboard magazine listed the album among records released in the period between March 16 and July of that same year.{{cite magazine|title=SINGLES & ALBUMS RELEASED - For period March 16 thru July |journal=The Billboard |date=August 19, 1957 |pages=36, 60 |url=https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/50s/1957/Billboard%201957-08-19.pdf |access-date=April 11, 2019|via=americanradiohistory.com}} Reviewing in April 1957, Billboard said "Rollins' latest effort should really start musicians buzzing", as "the tenorman is one of the most vigorous, dynamic and inventive of modern jazzmen", and "everytrack is packed with surprises, tho Rollins develops each solo with great architectural logic".{{cite journal |title=Special Merit Jazz Album |journal=The Billboard |date=April 27, 1957 |page=29 |url=https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/50s/1957/Billboard%201957-04-27.pdf |access-date=April 11, 2019|via=americanradiohistory.com}} Ralph J. Gleason reviewed the album later in June for DownBeat, writing:
{{cquote|Almost as if in answer to the charge that there is a lack of grace and beauty in the work of the New York hard-swingers comes this album in which Rollins displays humor, gentleness, a delicate feeling for beauty in line, and a puckish sense of humor. And all done with the uncompromising swinging that has characterized them all along.}}
In a retrospective review for AllMusic, Scott Yanow called Saxophone Colossus "arguably his finest all-around set",Yanow, S. [{{AllMusic|class=album|id=r186121|pure_url=yes}} AllMusic Review] accessed 7 October 2009 while German musicologist Peter Niklas Wilson deemed it "another milestone of the Rollins discography, a recording repeatedly cited as Rollins' chef d'oeuvre, and one of the classic jazz albums of all time".{{cite book|last = Wilson|first = Peter Niklas|year = 2001|title = Sonny Rollins: The Definitive Musical Guide|chapter = Discography|publisher = Berkeley Hills Books|pages = 124|isbn = 1-893163-06-7}}
In 2000 it was voted number 405 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums.{{cite book|title=All Time Top 1000 Albums|author=Colin Larkin|author-link=Colin Larkin|publisher=Virgin Books|date=2000|edition=3rd|isbn=0-7535-0493-6|page=152}} The Penguin Guide to Jazz included the album in its suggested "core collection" of essential recordings, and in addition to its maximum rating of four stars awarded it a "crown", indicating an album for which the authors felt particular admiration or affection.
Track listing
=Side one=
{{track listing
| title1 = St. Thomas
| writer1 = Sonny Rollins
| length1 = 6:49
| title2 = You Don't Know What Love Is
| writer2 = Gene de Paul, Don Raye
| length2 = 6:30
| title3 = Strode Rode
| writer3 = Sonny Rollins
| length3 = 5:17
}}
=Side two=
{{track listing
| title1 = Moritat
| writer1 = Kurt Weill, Bertolt Brecht
| length1 = 10:05
| title2 = Blue 7
| writer2 = Sonny Rollins
| length2 = 11:17
}}
Personnel
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- {{Discogs master|type=album|174519}}
- [https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-recording-preservation-board/documents/SonnyRollinsInterview.pdf Interview with Sonny Rollins] from the Library of Congress
{{Sonny Rollins}}{{Tommy Flanagan}}{{Max Roach}}
{{Authority control}}
Category:Prestige Records albums
Category:Albums produced by Bob Weinstock
Category:Albums recorded at Van Gelder Studio
Category:United States National Recording Registry recordings