Sonny Rollins at National Music Center, Aug. 22, 1998

by Seth Rogovoy

(LENOX , Mass., Aug. 23, 1998) -- Tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins, one of the last living links to jazz music’s most fertile period of innovation and experimentation, bridged the decades since the post-bop years of the ‘50s and ‘60s with another demonstration of his lingering command of his idiom on Saturday night at the National Music Center.

On a night that looked back to an earlier time when jazz was first being institutionalized right here at the Music Inn -- when the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Max Roach, Charles Mingus and Rollins himself were frequent guests at the Barbers’ place down the road from Tanglewood -- Rollins’s dogged determinism in the face of cultural adversity was all the more poignant for his refusal to pay heed to anything but his inner muse.

Fortunately, that muse has always been responsive to the relationship between performer and audience, and thus the crowd was treated to an open, gregarious program by Rollins and his sextet.

Typically mixing original compositions, standards, blues and his trademark calypsos, Rollins was a generous bandleader, sharing the solo spotlight with several of his accomplished sidemen, most notably pianist Stephen Scott.

Like Rollins, Scott is a playful, intelligent virtuoso with a great command of different styles and a flair for combining them in original, thought-provoking ways.

Propelled by the rhythm section of drummer Perry Wilson, percussionist Victor See-Yuen and longtime Rollins bass-guitarist Bob Cranshaw, the Rollins sextet was a versatile, dynamic engine, responding with sympathy and power to the varying demands placed on it by the eclectic nature of the material.

Coming out swinging, Rollins kicked off the evening with the self-penned, swing-funk tune “Biji,” a vehicle for his signature improvisations, which he constructs out of bebop lines, ostinatos, arpeggios, pedal points and bursts of noise, yet always with reference to the song’s melody.

A new calypso piece, the title track to his most recent album, “Global Warming,” sparked the most athletic performance of the night from Rollins and his ensemble, which set a groove so filled with tension and release that the audience literally sprang to its feet at the number’s conclusion, as if in involuntary response to the music.

Another new song, the mournful, ambiguously-titled ballad, “Echo-Side Blue,” showcased Rollins’s more lyrical aspect. Flavored with a bit of New Orleans funerealism courtesy of trombonist Clifton Anderson and with a strutting bass line laid down by Cranshaw, the number featured Rollins “singing” through his instrument with shades of Billie Holiday.

Rollins surrendered most of the solo spotlight in the second half of the program to his sidemen. On the standard, “Falling in Love with Love,” he traded fours with percussionist See-Yuen, playfully quoting phrases from other tunes such as “The Good Life.” The calypso “Duke of Iron,” ordinarily a showcase for the saxophonist, was given over almost wholly to See-Yuen, who took an extended, a cappella solo on conga.

The closing number, “Don’t Stop the Carnival,” came much too fast and too soon for the audience members caught in the clutches of the calypso’ s ineffable dance beat. Rollins responded to those dancing in front of the stage with a lively solo full of bent and split notes and deep honks, acknowledging the music’s roots as the soundtrack to celebration.

If Rollins seemed somewhat restrained and withholding, it was only in contrast to his over-the-top performance at last year’s Labor Day weekend appearance at Tanglewood, where he painted a landscape of relentless peaks and valleys. Saturday night’s show was more of a gently sloping affair, but one hardly any less richer or resonant for the profound storytelling prowess it evinced from our greatest living jazzman.

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