Sonny Rollins
Videos
Walter Theodore "Sonny" Rollins was an American jazz tenor saxophonist who is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential of jazz musicians.
Rollins in 1974
Rollins at the San Francisco Opera House on February 22, 1982
Rollins at the Newport Jazz Festival in 2008
Rollins in 2011
Hard bop
Videos
Hard bop is a subgenre of jazz that is an extension of bebop. Journalists and record companies began using the term in the mid-1950s to describe a new current within jazz that incorporated influences
Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, 1960. Pictured are Lee Morgan (left), Jymie Merritt (center), and Art Blakey (right) (saxophonist Wayne Shorter stands mostly hidden behind Merritt).
Horace Silver Quintet in Amsterdam, 1959
Horace Silver
Wynton Marsalis, an important figure in the revival of bop