Jay McShann passed away May 25, 2026
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“The Saxophone Colossus died May 25, 2026 at his home in Woodstock, NY at the age of 95. ” Rollins’ publicist later confirmed the news. No cause of death has been shared, though a quote from Rollins himself was included at the end of the post.
“ I think when the creative person ends, he continues in the next existence. I’m a person who believes this life isn’t the be-all and end-all of everything. A spiritual person doesn’t feel like that. ”—“Oleo,” “Doxy,” “Airegin”—are standards of the genre.
He was a master hard bop composer who was born in New York City in September 1930 to parents from the Virgin Islands. He had three siblings. While living in central Harlem, Rollins started alto saxophone lessons at age seven after hearing Louis Jordan. When he discovered his idol Coleman Hawkins, Rollins’ instrument of choice became the tenor saxophone.
His high school band featured Jackie McLean, Art Taylor, and Kenny Drew. Rollins graduated high school in 1948 and found work as a sideman for Babs Gonzales. Once he started playing with trombonist J.J. Johnson, Rollins was taken under the wing of pianist Bud Powell and began to perfect his hard bop impulse.
But an armed robbery arrest briefly sidelined his career in 1950 while he served ten months at Rikers. Upon his release, Rollins found himself in bands with Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, and Charlie Parker.
He caught a break with “Oleo,” which featured Davis, Horace Silver, Kenny Clarke, and Percy Heath, and landed on theA year later, Rollins was a member of the Miles Davis Quintet and the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet and cut a record of his own with the latter,Brown died in a car accident in 1956, but Rollins kept playing with Roach, recording albums for Prestige, Riverside, Contemporary, and Blue Note labels. That summer, he recorded his biggest album,bore one of Rollins’ greatest compositions: “St. Thomas,” a reworking of the traditional Bahamian folk song “Sponger Money” that became the Virgin Islands nursery rhyme “Hold Him Joe,” which Rollins’ mother sang to him.
More records came, as did appearances with Thelonious Monk, practices with Ornette Coleman, and a marriage to model Dawn Finney. Rollins soon became known as “Newk” because he looked like Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher Don Newcombe. In 1957, he debuted at Carnegie Hall and recorded again with J.J. Johnson, Horace Silver, Monk, and Art Blakey.
He and Sonny Stitt featured on Dizzy Gillespie’sA Great Day in HarlemAs the Sixties crept in, Rollins started going on sabbaticals. He practiced yoga and played saxophone on the Williamsburg Bridge for fifteen hours a day so he wouldn’t disturb his neighbor, who was an expectant mother. Rollins came back to the Village jazz scene in 1961 and released his comeback album,, the following year. He started experimenting with Latin rhythms, avant-garde, and Great American Songbook melodies.
His signing with Impulse! in 1966 led to. By the end of the decade, Rollins was on sabbatical again, this time for two years in Jamaica and India, where he studied yoga and Eastern philosophy. In 1972, he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in music composition. Throughout the Seventies and Eighties, Rollins explored pop and funk music and even performed for President Jimmy Carter on the White House lawn.
He got really into unaccompanied sax cadenzas around this time, doing so on “Autumn Nocturne” and, later,Tattoo You songs, “Waiting on a Friend” and “Slave. ” In 1983, the National Endowment for the Arts honored him as a jazz master. He was presented with a lifetime achievement award at the 2004 GRAMMYs and awarded a National Medal of Arts six years later. six years ago, Rollins said, “Dying, it’s funny. Everybody is afraid to die because it’s the unknown.
But my mother died. My father died. My brother died. My sister died.
My uncle died. My grandmother died. They’re all great people. If they can die then why can’t I die?
I’m better than they are? It’s ridiculous to feel, Oh, gee,shouldn’t die. My body is going to turn into dust. But my soul will live forever.
” May we meet your soul again down the road, Colossus. Listen to Sonny Rollins perform at Great American Music Hall, Philharmonic Hall, and Carnegie Hall below.
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