One of the all-time greatest saxophone players, Sonny Rollins, passed away earlier this week at the age of 95. To say this is a huge loss to the jazz world would be an understatement.
He was the last surviving person who was photographed by Art Kane in the famous []“A Great Day in Harlem”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Great_Day_in_Harlem) portrait. Truly the end of an era.
With a lengthy career that started in the 50s with Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie all the way through to his retirement in 2012 he made dozens of classic albums.
People, of course, flock to the all-timers like Saxophone Colossus, Way Out West, A Night at the Village Vangard and Freedom Suite and that is a justified response. All of these records are exceptional and essential listening.
Even though I love all the aforementioned records, I tend to play his records from the mid 1970s most often.
From 1969-1971 Sonny Rollins went on a sabbatical where he didn’t play. He traveled to Jamaica and India. He focused on yoga and meditation and returned to music completely transformed. Starting with Next Album in 1972 he started featuring more hard funk and jazz fusion in his records. Horn Culture and Nucleus continued this trajectory which culminated in 1976 with The Way I Feel, which is today’s pick!
The Way I Feel has an all-star cast, but not in the same way as other Sonny Rollins albums even from the same era. This includes some of my favorite instrumentalists like Patrice Rushen on keyboards and Billy Cobham on drums. Guitarist Lee Ritenour, percussionist Bill Summers and bassists Charlies Meeks and Alex Blake round out the bill. There’s even an extended horn section on a bunch of the songs. I don’t believe this core lineup appeared on any other Sonny Rollins albums or performed live together. If I’m mistaken, I’d love to be corrected because this group was red hot!
One of my favorite songs on the record is “Asfrantation Woogie” which sounds like it could have been the theme song of a 1970s sitcom. Really funky stuff.
“Asfrantation Woogie” was performed around this time at The Great American Music Hall in San Francisco but with a completely different lineup (Mark Soskin – Piano, Jerome Harris – Bass, Al Foster – Drums). It still sounds great:
I also love “Happy Feel” which is a song that couldn’t be more aptly named:
While most of the songs included on the album are written by Rollins, there are a couple great exceptions. The first being “Shout It Out” by Patrice Rushen. She plays great on the cut too!
Finally “The Way I Feel About You” was written by George Duke. It is a typically funky number from that master keyboard player that has his signature motifs all over it:
Sonny Rollins continued his career long after The Way I Feel and it was filled with even more highlights. He never really had an era that wasn’t completely beyond reproach. I could list album after album and listen to them for days, but I feel like focusing on The Way I Feel here is a great opporunity to showcase one of his lesser known albums and periods that deserve a revisit.
