{"id":13538,"date":"2010-09-10T09:49:40","date_gmt":"2010-09-10T13:49:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/?p=13538"},"modified":"2010-09-10T09:50:45","modified_gmt":"2010-09-10T13:50:45","slug":"interview-with-jazz-legend-sonny-rollins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/2010\/09\/10\/interview-with-jazz-legend-sonny-rollins\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with jazz legend Sonny Rollins"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Photo: John Abbott<\/p><\/div>\n

By JQ Magazine<\/strong><\/em><\/a>\u2019s\u00a0<\/em>Justin Tedaldi<\/strong><\/em><\/a> <\/strong>(CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02)\u00a0for Examiner.com.\u00a0Visit his NY Japanese Culture\u00a0page<\/em> here<\/strong><\/em><\/a> to subscribe for free alerts\u00a0on newly published stories.<\/em><\/p>\n

Grammy-winning tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins\u00a0began his eighth decade of life Tuesday, and will celebrate with a headlining concert at\u00a0New York’s\u00a0Beacon Theatre on Sept. 10. I spoke with the man the New York Times<\/em> recently called \u201cindisputable jazz royalty\u201d about his relationship with Japan and his inimitable philosophy of life.<\/p>\n

What are your thoughts about turning 80?<\/strong>
\nWell, actually, I don\u2019t think too much about it because I\u2019m a pretty busy fellow. It just so happens that I looked at the calendar, and here I am, 80!<\/p>\n

After the New York concert, you have three Japanese gigs in October: Sapporo, Tokyo, and Osaka. Can you describe your history with Japan?<\/strong>
\nWell, I\u2019ve been going to Japan for many years now, I think\u2014since 1963, maybe. And regularly, I go there\u2026the first time I went to Japan, I was taken by the culture, and I was very much looking forward every time I would get a chance to go back. I used to spend a lot of time in these areas\u2014temples, and examining the Zen Buddhist culture, and the various musical instruments that are indigenous to Japan. My wife and I were very fond of going to the Noh theater, and we used to go there every time we got a chance to when we were in Japan. I really love the culture; I love the Buddhist culture, and that\u2019s old Japan.<\/p>\n

So, that\u2019s what I always looked for; sought out; yearned for that; when I was away from Japan. It was always, \u201cYeah, I wish I could get back and smell<\/em> the country,\u201d you know? The bamboo forests, the sound of the shakuhachi<\/em> [Japanese flute], and the very peaceful places. The last time I was there\u2014I was there on vacation recently\u2014and I was at Kamakura, it\u2019s among the places that are really so beautifully serene and peaceful. So I really enjoyed that. Of course, I\u2019ve been to Kyoto many, many times, and Nara, and many other parts of the country.<\/p>\n

So, I love Japan. As I said, the first time I went there, I got a feeling of great\u2014when I got off the plane, I just felt happy for some reason. And I felt as if I was rediscovering some place that I\u2019d been to in a previous life or something. And I still maintain those feelings about Japan today.<\/p>\n

Was there any hesitation about going there the first time regarding American sentiments after the war? Did you have any impressions that were turned around based on the reception you received?<\/strong>
\nAs you know, music is\u00a0universal\u2026jazz music is a peaceful force, and it\u2019s received all over the world, and people in Japan are very interested in jazz music. They\u2019re really knowledgeable about the music; they\u2019re very interested in the people that play it, and they love it.<\/p>\n

Read the complete\u00a0interview here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By JQ Magazine\u2019s\u00a0Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02)\u00a0for Examiner.com.\u00a0Visit his NY Japanese Culture\u00a0page here to subscribe for free alerts\u00a0on newly published stories. Grammy-winning tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins\u00a0began his eighth decade of life Tuesday, and will celebrate with a headlining concert at\u00a0New York’s\u00a0Beacon Theatre on Sept. 10. I spoke with the man the New York Times recently […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,25,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articlejournalism","category-interviewprofile","category-music"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pkZ7m-3wm","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13538"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13538\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13542,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13538\/revisions\/13542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}