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TTP #14- Sonny Rollins- Ruminations with the Jazz Legend on his Career, Spiritual Explorations, Yoga practice and a Life in Music
12 Plays5 years ago
It is such an honor to kick off the 2nd season of the Tourganic Podcast with the legendary Sonny Rollins. Sonny is one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, whose career spanned nearly 70 years. The saxophone master has released over 60 albums as a leader as well as collaborating/recording with the preeminient lumineers of jazz such as Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Art Blakey just to name a few. His daily Williamsburg bridge practice sessions during his 1959 sabbatical have become iconic piece of New York history. Sonny has been on a lifetime spiritual quest to expand his consciousness and a path of discovery that he has worked to achieve through a committed Yoga practice since the late 50’s. His journey continued when he moved to India to live in an ashram and commit fully to his spiritual practice. Sonny's words are inspiring, thought provoking and deeply meaningful. This episode covers a lot of ground.
Intro music: 'Do you?' from DB3 album 'Firebrand'
Episode interludes are taken from: Sonny Rollins 'Road Shows, Vol.3'
In this conversation:
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What led him on the path of spiritual and enlightening quest
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Losing the ability to play Sax because of illness and acceptance
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Role Yoga plays in his life
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Connection between spiritual pursuit and musical output
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Traveling to the Ashram and living in India
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Autobiography of a Yogi
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Self Realization fellowship
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When you play your horn, that is meditation
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Being truly present and in the now when playing+Creating is next level
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Connection between practice and achieving flow state mentality
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Performance vs practice mindstate
- Performance – Make your mind blank and let the music play you- passive
- Never feeling like he can get to ‘that’ place every night
- Consciousness of health and spirituality in the 50’s leading to the 60’s
- Daily Yoga practice on the road
- Different types of yoga to develop
- Using practice to achieve Self realization- self betterment
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The importance of long tones- Slowing down- positivity
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Sonny Rollins' Philosophy
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to the Torgannic Pie. You know, when I perform, I try to lose consciousness. People have asked me, well, Sonny, what do you think about when you're performing and you're soloing? And my answer has always been, I don't want to think about anything. That's what I don't want to do, is think. I want to let the music play me.
00:00:27
Speaker
Welcome to Season 2 of the Torganic Podcast. I'm David Bayless, the host. I'm so honored to kick this season off with the great Sonny Rollins. Sonny is one of the most important and influential musicians of the 20th century, and arguably the greatest and most legendary living saxophone player in jazz musician period.
00:00:46
Speaker
He has recorded over 60 albums as a leader, including the groundbreaking Saxophone Colossus and Freedom Suite, as well as played and recorded with nearly every major jazz figure from the 40s, 50s, and 60s.
Sonny Rollins' Spiritual Journey
00:00:58
Speaker
Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Art Blakey, and the list could go on and on. He is definitely on the Mount Rushmore of jazz.
00:01:08
Speaker
Beyond that, I've learned through speaking with him that he's a deeply kind and humble individual. Someone who's been on a lifetime spiritual quest to expand his consciousness and a path of discovery that he has worked to achieve through his committed yoga practice since the late 50s. Without further ado, let's get into this. Sunny dropped some serious gems in this conversation and we start at the beginning with Sunny telling me about coming up in New York in the 40s as a young jazz musician.
00:01:35
Speaker
Oh, yeah. I was born in New York. I'm a New Yorker. I was born in Harlem. And at an early age, I realized I wanted to be a musician. One of my early favorites was, I heard a lot of music in New York as a kid, but I liked Fat Chihuahua when they heard Fat Chihuahua's band.
00:02:04
Speaker
That's well, I said, wow, man, I'm a good nurse. And then I liked the saxophone. It used to be a guy called Lewis Jordan. Yeah, of course. And I loved him and I got to be a D.O.T. of Lewis Jordan. So at an early age, my mother got me a saxophone or a used saxophone, you know. So I think I did around seven.
00:02:33
Speaker
And I knew then that I wanted to be a musician. And so that's when I started. I was into it very early. And what about in maybe more like the late 40s when
Early Musical Influences in Harlem
00:02:48
Speaker
you were a late teen? Right, right, right. Well, I was, of course I was doing, we had a little band of a lot of guys that
00:03:02
Speaker
played together and uh some pretty good guys actually was our band Jackie McLean and Art Taylor and some very good players came out you know came out to be very famous people sure yeah but uh so we just we had a band and then we played uh with different people as we got older we
00:03:29
Speaker
the guys in our neighborhood, the big time guys began, you know, noticing us and hiring us off. And, uh, then the library came into being, you know, I'd be, I got hired by, uh, this guy, and I made a record with him and I got to play with all these big time guys, and
00:03:56
Speaker
Dexter Gordon and all these big-time guys. So that's the way I just got into it, because I was on the scene, and I sort of grew right up into it. That's what I was doing. I realized for my child, that's why I wanted to do music, and it was a straight road up the sugar in the way of speaking.
00:04:25
Speaker
Life was not a straight road, but as far as what I wanted to do, as I told you, that came early. From then on, I was just getting accepted and learning and being mentored, the whole thing.
00:04:47
Speaker
Yeah and that makes me think of something that at such a young age you had that sense of what your path was in music. Not that you knew exactly what was going to happen but you knew music was for you. I wonder kind of in a sense of
00:05:03
Speaker
nature versus nurture in a musical sense.
The Liberation of Musical Destiny
00:05:06
Speaker
Do you think that you've had this gift and it's something that you've just worked on bringing out throughout your life or your success really come from an intense level of discipline and practice? Well, I would take a little bit of both. Yeah. A little bit of both. One thing I didn't mention to you was that when I was about seven and eight years old,
00:05:33
Speaker
I knew that I would be a prominent musician. At what moment did you realize that? Well, I just realized that. You know, thinking about it, I just knew how much I wanted to play and everything. But I got an insight, a vision, an insight that I would be a prominent musician. And I always had that feeling all my life.
00:06:04
Speaker
Sure enough, I became prominent. I did reach some prominence. Did that become a well for you to draw from, that you had this premonition, this belief, or did it almost become weight on you that you were, in a sense, locked in, or was it a liberating thing that you had this? It was very liberating. In fact, as I look back on it now, I realize that that's what
00:06:31
Speaker
That's one of the things that kept me right on track. I mean, I love the music, but there's so many things that happen to human beings during a lifetime. There's a lot of things that could have got me off course. But I think the fact that I had this permission early on that I would be prominent, I think that gave me a release.
00:07:00
Speaker
so that I didn't have to even worry about it. I always knew that I would come back to that, that that would happen, you know? Right. At this young age, were you already practicing? Was the sense of discipline already ingrained in you? You mean when I first had that premonition? Oh yeah, I would say so because I loved music. It wasn't a premonition, it was the fact that I loved
00:07:30
Speaker
music and practicing was something that I just loved doing. I didn't think of it as a chore. It was something which I just looked forward to doing every minute I could get that heart in my mouth. So it didn't have anything to do with that.
00:07:55
Speaker
I wanted to play anyway. And is that a sentiment that continued throughout your musical life? It continued up to be exactly. It continues today when I'm unable to play my horn anymore. It still continues. I still think of my music. And, you know, I've got to deal with that. I've dealt with the fact
00:08:25
Speaker
And I've lived there for four or five years now since I have been unable to play my horn. And so I was able to accept it, but I still, in fact, recently have been thinking about it more and more. I have to try to stop thinking about it because I know I can't carry it to a conclusion.
00:08:53
Speaker
try out all of these things and all this kind of stuff. Right. But you still have that music inside of you. Oh, good. Yeah. Right. Because I didn't finish. See, I didn't finish. I wanted to. I was still a guy that practiced all the time. Everywhere I went, practicing, practicing. I loved doing it. Yeah. I was a guy that practiced.
00:09:22
Speaker
After the concert was over, I was trying to work on something. And I'm working on it. The people in the band is packed up. People are left to entertain. People are going home. I'm in the dressing room trying to figure this thing out, something that played in it. So that's just my nature, and I always loved it. Now I felt
00:09:51
Speaker
Unfortunately, I had to stop playing before I finished whatever I was getting for. So I didn't really, you know, however, rather than being upset of my dad or blaming the heavens for how come I didn't get it, I thought I was getting there, I was on a journey.
00:10:19
Speaker
I didn't quite make it, but that's okay. I'm still very grateful for what I was able to do and play music for most of my life and achieve a little prominence just like I knew I would when I was seven, eight years old. Yeah, it takes a great, I'd imagine, level of just acceptance. Acceptance, yes, that's how I get
00:10:47
Speaker
takes wisdom, patience, prayer, and everything like that to get that acceptance.
00:11:14
Speaker
And have you been able to find any other outlets, even though you can't play saxophone and not even necessarily playing piano, but have you been able to find any other outlets in your life that have given you some sense of gratification and wholeness given what's been taken away? Yeah, well, the only thing that I have been, I've always, I've been, I've been what you would call a person that's interested in
00:11:43
Speaker
in the spirit world. So I was always, I was studying rasakushinism when I was a certain age. And I grew up with Christian and Christian church, but after I got older, I got into rasakushinism, then
Yoga and Meditation: The Sabbatical
00:12:03
Speaker
I got into yoga. Right. And so the study of yoga
00:12:12
Speaker
And related various Buddhism and related pursuits like that has been what I've replaced.
00:12:24
Speaker
my music with. I'm really curious about how you got into yoga, the why and how as yoga has become a part of, as you well know, mainstream culture today. But I believe that when you started it, it was much less well known. Yeah, when I got into yoga, I had been, I had been, I'd been into
00:12:53
Speaker
These things I told you, the Rosicrucian group, they sort of had a study of their claim to be originating from ancient Egypt and having to do with metaphysics, et cetera, et cetera. So I got into that. But then I was reading a lot.
00:13:22
Speaker
this book by my friend Paramahansa Yogananda, Autobiography for Yoga. And that was a very powerful book, a very influential book. And I read that book. I had been sort of introduced to Sufism, which is very similar to yoga.
00:13:51
Speaker
the yogis and the Hindus and the Sufis and the Islamic, you know, they're very, very similar. They were very similar in what they were going after. Their belief system to some degree. Yeah, their belief systems are very similar. So I got into yoga, yogism.
00:14:20
Speaker
And I got into a haka yoga at first because the rest of it was a little bit too much for me to understand, which as you know, haka yoga, which is just one aspect of yogaism. So I got into that doing the postures.
00:14:48
Speaker
and all that to the best of my ability. I got some books and looked at them. One time I went to a woman that had written a book on it and everything, but it was after I went to India. I went to India studying
00:15:09
Speaker
Yeah, yoga. So let me just to get this straight. But in terms of the chronology, were you already experimenting with yoga before you did the trip to India? Is that that's? Oh, yeah. Yeah, well before that. And because you took the sabbatical in the late 50s, right?
00:15:30
Speaker
And that's when I got into yoga, really. Right. And what in your life, was there something that I get that you're saying, kind of you were checking out Sufism and maybe it was just spiritual exploration, but was there something in your life that you felt that you felt the yoga and the break from playing live helped bring you back onto track in a sense? Well,
00:16:00
Speaker
I really, you know, by the time I was in the late 50s, I had lived enough to realize that living is not all that it's cracked up to be. So that there was a lot of things that were going on which were not, you know, by that time I had had quite a
00:16:24
Speaker
Quite a life before that time. I had a drug addiction and all of this stuff. Right. Way back in the 1940s. I mean, I knew that life, you know, life couldn't be rough. Yes. So by the 1950s, I had gone through quite a bit. And I knew that I was looking for a guide.
00:16:54
Speaker
to life, you know, a spiritual guide, if you will. And that's why I was interested in yoga, Buddhism, what I understood about it. That in the 1950s, it wasn't the beginning of my quest for life.
00:17:23
Speaker
crises in my life came up earlier than that. Gotcha. To show me that I needed to, you know, I needed, I needed discipline. If there was something about life which you can't just, you can't just go through life and everything is hunky-dory or if it's not, then you do so. I mean, I realized there was something more to life
00:17:50
Speaker
And I was able to understand at that point. Right. Did you feel that, and it might be oversimplification, but did you ever feel that your yoga and your development in yoga and your spiritual practice, was that
00:18:13
Speaker
Of course, it was a part of your overall being and your consciousness, so it affected your music, but was that something you ever thought about, the connection between music and your spiritual pursuits and practices? I didn't separate them. Yeah. I understand that. And this separation was all the same thing. When you then took it to the next level, and you
00:18:39
Speaker
moved to India, what sort of precipitated that whole move in your life to want to go to that place and go to the ashram and experience that? Right, right. Well, I began reading autobiography of a yogi in the 50s.
00:19:01
Speaker
They said from then on, I was really studying yoga as much as I could. And in the 60s, I wanted to go to this place. There was a couple of places. This organization that I was first introduced to in this book, Self-Realization Fellowship, they were still
00:19:28
Speaker
They're actually still around and they're still helping people and all this stuff. But anyway, by doing the 1960s, I had some other, I took another sabbatical and figured that I wanted to get a little more into, see if I could get a little more inside knowledge of yoga. And so I went to
00:19:58
Speaker
I took some time off and I traveled to India. And what did you take away from that experience? Well, there were a lot of things, of course, a lot of things, you know, going to a new place, seeing different things, different cultures and all that, you know, that was interesting. But the thing that I got with the fellow, the guy that was the, we wouldn't call the guru, he was called the
00:20:28
Speaker
Swami. Swami, okay. Swami had the ashram that I was at. You know, we were talking. So, you know, I was telling you, you were telling me such, I tell them everything. So I said, well, I tell them about meditation. I said, well, you know, Swami is very hard for me to meditate because I'm from New York and there was always background noise, always going on. Yeah.
00:20:57
Speaker
I had my request. I liked it. I got used to having the radio on all night. We used to listen to radio shows, my wife and myself and all that. And so it was always a background noise and I found trying to sit down quietly and meditate
00:21:24
Speaker
It was very difficult for me. I just couldn't clear my mind. So, Rislami said, well, Swami, you know what? He said, when you play your horn, that is meditation. That is meditation. And so, when he told me that a light went on in my head, and I said, well, yeah. He said, you know, you're doing something positive, you're trying to create,
00:21:52
Speaker
You're meditating in that way. I'm trying to especially, well, any kind of music, especially when you play jazz, where there's a music where you're trying to improvise, you're trying to create. Yeah. That's the form of meditation right there. Right. Fully being in the moment. Of course. Right. Absolutely in the moment. And once in the moment, there's anything you can do. Yeah.
00:22:22
Speaker
of a selfless nature. I mean, you know, there's a lot of things you can do. You can have sex and all that stuff. That's in the moment, too. But when you're trying to create something which is of a celestial level, where you go up into the music, nobody knows what music is, where it comes from.
00:22:51
Speaker
When you're doing that, you're raising yourself above the body level already. So that's why I say it's different than you could say being in the moment. Yeah, I can be in the moment doing other things, but being in the moment and you're trying to create musically, this is being more than being in the moment. It's being on a very high level of being in the moment.
00:23:22
Speaker
Do you know what I mean? I definitely do and as a musician I feel that we're always searching searching for that and I wonder for you even you had that knowledge and the Swami said that and I'm sure that was an enlightening moment where you realize that but still that doesn't necessarily mean that every time you play you achieve that right you still have to that magic doesn't always happen and I wonder for you
00:23:49
Speaker
If you agree with that, that it doesn't always happen if you had strategies to achieve that flow state where you get in that higher level of consciousness in playing. Well, the reason why I like to practice as much as I do, I mean, I'm always practicing. I'm sure you know about my practicing on the bridge, right? I do, yep.
00:24:16
Speaker
Okay, so that's a well-known story, but I practice all the time, wherever I'm at. I go out by the ocean, when I'm near the ocean breakfast in the park, any place where I can be alone with my music, so that that thing that you said, well, you can't always achieve it, I always
00:24:43
Speaker
I'm always achieving that because it's music and it's meditation at the same time. So I'm always achieving that. Now, I don't know if you meant, does that mean that I'm always playing great or something like that? It's easy to confuse the two. It doesn't mean that I'm always going to play great
00:25:07
Speaker
when they're performing. It has nothing to do with that really. And it's beyond great, I mean more reaching the level that you were a musician that you or I are that were personally striving to reach.
00:25:22
Speaker
in the moment on stage, you know, versus, oh, this is great, which is essentially a judgment call. A lot of musicians have had the experience of you don't feel you had the best night and someone comes out and, oh yeah, you played so great tonight and you say, oh, okay, thanks, you know, but inside you feel like, oh, I didn't get there. Right, right, of course. I'm sure I would imagine you've had that experience.
00:25:43
Speaker
I'm often, often. And in that sense, that's what I meant. Did you ever have a strategy or is it something you thought about of ways to try to channel yourself so you would put yourself in the position to have those in your own mind, not in anyone else's judgment call, a truly fulfilling experience on stage? Yeah, yeah, I'm always trying to do that. I'm always trying to do that because that's, as I said, that's my
00:26:13
Speaker
motor zaparundi to try to get into that position when you've been in that thought and to get a higher level of thought and everything. Yeah, I'm always thinking like that and the result is not always there because
00:26:36
Speaker
There are a lot of things involved, even what, you know, it can be when I'm practicing. There's sometimes when I feel more fulfilled than other times. The performing thing is a whole somewhat different, it's not different, but it's somewhat of a different aspect of what we're talking about, the meditating thing.
00:27:04
Speaker
When, you know, when you're performing, then you're sort of, you know, when I perform, I try to lose consciousness. People have asked me, well, Sonny, what do you think about when you're performing and you're soloing? And my answer has always been, I don't want to think about anything. That's what I don't want to do, is think. I want to let the music play me.
00:27:33
Speaker
I don't want to think about any. I don't want to think, well, gee, what's the next chord that comes next? What's the next melody? Gee, let me play. I used to have some little tricks, licks that I would play, and a quote from a modern song or something. But, oh, gee, wow, look how clever Sonny is.
00:28:02
Speaker
And then I couldn't do that because every time I tried to think about something to play and I was going to put it in and I'm playing a solo and I'm trying to think, oh yeah, let me put this in there. Bang, the time would be gone.
00:28:21
Speaker
It moves too fast. Yeah, the time is moving too fast. I can't think and play at the same time. I just have to make my mind blank. And then all these thoughts then will come into my mind. But I've got to be passive. See? I cannot try to be active and oh yeah, let me play this, let me play that. It doesn't work.
00:28:49
Speaker
I have to just have a blank mind. And that's what I realized a long time ago that that's what I do when I play. That's the idea.
00:29:22
Speaker
When you look back at your career, I'm curious if you see specific periods that were breakthroughs or your progress was more on a steady continuum throughout and it was always a path of experimentation and learning. Well, I would say more look has
00:29:42
Speaker
a path and a continuum. Yeah, if I look back on my career and picked out certain times, I guess, but basically, I never thought of it that way while I was in my throes of my career. I was always going from one level of achievement to the next. I never separated it and looked back and said, oh, this was a period when I was doing this.
00:30:13
Speaker
I mean, if I wanted to look back on my career and look at it that way, I might be able to try to find things that I was able to benefit from, but I never looked at it. And the time that I was playing, you know,
00:30:40
Speaker
Just like when I'm sewing, time is going by so fast. I don't have time to reflect on different periods and everything like that. It was all just one continuum of trying to improve myself and get better and to get to that place where I felt that I'd accomplished something, but that changed.
00:31:10
Speaker
because I couldn't think more back on some nights that I was playing. I felt, oh boy, this is great. I can play anything I felt like. But that didn't keep up that way. It didn't last. I didn't quite get to the point where my artistic expression was constant.
00:31:39
Speaker
when I could do it every night and feel this sense of accomplishment. I never got to that point. I'm not complaining now. I'm not complaining, as I said. I would imagine that almost every artist that's truly dedicated feels that, and that's what keeps us searching and striving and pushing and continuing to try to learn and be better all the time.
00:32:09
Speaker
I guess so. Maybe so, yeah. When you took those periods, those breaks, was there pushback from, you know, whether it was management people or your fellow musicians and people saying, Sonny, what are you doing? You're in the prime right now. You're on top. Why would you walk away? Did you ever
The Bridge Period: A Time for Growth
00:32:29
Speaker
feel that? Well, I got pushback when I went on the bridge because at that time I was sort of getting a lot of
00:32:39
Speaker
a claim and everything. But, you know, I had made some engagements and I wasn't satisfying myself. I wasn't satisfying the people. I remember, especially one engagement I had when that was particularly true. And, you know, people were expecting me to be everything that I wanted to be, but I wasn't able to do it.
00:33:09
Speaker
That's why I said I'm going to get away from the business for a while and I'll go in the woodshed and get myself together. That's what precipitated the bridge. So that was the only time that I had to confront this thing about people saying, oh, don't, you know, don't, don't go away. Don't go away. I might've, I might've had that at different times at some other point in my career when that might've been,
00:33:39
Speaker
an issue which at that time in particular I remember. I'm wondering if you the community of jazz musicians how did people react to
00:33:51
Speaker
your interest and dedication to your yoga practice? Were people interested, your friends and your fellow musicians? Was there a lot of other musicians at that time involved with that? Because to me it seems that it wasn't as much of a common thing of people doing yoga back in the 60s. I'm younger, I wasn't alive then, but my belief would be that you were sort of on the forefront of a movement of yoga at that period. And I'm curious if other musicians, how they reacted to it.
00:34:22
Speaker
Yeah, maybe so, but around that time, there were a lot of musicians, including myself, who were getting into healthy living, healthy eating, non-smoking. A lot of guys are getting into that. So yoga,
00:34:49
Speaker
and Buddhism or whatever the spiritual practice was sort of part of that whole progression at that time. For me, I'm very into health on a personal level with fitness and I'm an athlete and I tour hundreds of days a year and I'm always working out on the road and I'm really into my diet. I don't eat any meat or dairy. I'm a vegan.
00:35:16
Speaker
I'm really trying to maintain that lifestyle while touring. And a lot of people are constantly just shocked whether there are other musicians or whether they're just fans and they're blown away that, oh, is that possible? Or I thought all musicians just drank and partied all the time. And you know what I mean? So that's sort of partly what this whole podcast is about, is about talking to other musicians that are exploring that side of themselves and
00:35:45
Speaker
trying to find a balance that will sustain them long-term while living this life as a musician on the road. Right. So that's cool to hear that in the 60s there was a lot of interest in living healthy back then. Yes, yes, yes. In the 50s also, going into 60s, guys would be getting to know about those things, trying to eat right.
00:36:14
Speaker
So it wasn't that strange in that period of time. It was, the dawning of that age was beginning to come, I think. Guys are realizing, a lot of guys juicing used to juice, you know? And like that, there's a lot of consciousness in the 50s, and the 50s progressed about those things.
00:37:00
Speaker
For you, when you're on the road traveling on tour, you were able to maintain your yoga practice? Well, I'll tell you what I did when I went on the road. I used to
00:37:12
Speaker
I mean, after I went to a hotel, I always tried to stay at the best hotels that I was able to stay in, for many reasons. One reason was that I didn't want to go out, you know. I mean, this was once I'd been around the block. Once I got to a hotel, I went to say
00:37:42
Speaker
a decent clean hotel, a little clean because I wanted to be, I would have to be lying down on the floor. I wanted a clean hotel for that reason alone. And sometimes I'd have to bring me an extra set of sheets.
00:38:09
Speaker
so that I could lay them on the floor and do my yoga. That makes sense. And when I couldn't do that, I was saying good, clean hotels where I was able to get down on the floor and do my yoga. Would you have sort of a daily ritual when you were on tour?
00:38:39
Speaker
No, I never had a deal. I mean, there were certain things often that I did. There were certain postures that I did because they came easily for me to do them and so on and so forth. But yeah, I guess you could say I had a daily ritual. Would you typically do your yoga practice in the morning or would it just be kind of whenever you could fit it in?
00:39:06
Speaker
Whenever I could put it in. Whenever I could put it in. Do you have, as someone who's been a practitioner of yoga for so many years, do you have any thoughts about the massive popularity of yoga these days and sort of the commodification of what yoga has become?
Reflecting on Influence and Legacy
00:39:23
Speaker
Is it something that you think is a positive thing? Well, I look at it a little negative. Maybe I shouldn't. But I look at it a little
00:39:35
Speaker
I mean, I'm being a little bit of a crank on it, but I, you know, because yoga is not just, not hatha, hatha yoga is, as you know, if you know why yoga, that's just one, one practice of yoga. Right. And that's exercises. Everybody wants to do exercises like in these Western countries.
00:40:04
Speaker
when you do exercise and you say, okay, well, that's probably okay. But yoga is not, that's not, that's only one aspect of yoga. Right, yoga has sort of become, in a lot of ways, this, oh, instead of going to the gym today, I'm doing my yoga class. Right. And that may be okay, I mean, I can't criticize that.
00:40:33
Speaker
You know, it's probably better than going to the movies, so I can't criticize that, but yoga's so much more. You know, there's karma yoga, there's kriya yoga, there's rajah yoga, there's jnana yoga, all these things which were made to create the
00:41:02
Speaker
enlightened individual. It wasn't just doing exercises. Right. Yeah. So that's why I'm getting, I get up on my high horse sometimes when people ask me why the yoga is all over the place. Yeah, but then that's, that's sort of a very superficial Western style of yoga.
00:41:51
Speaker
You've had such a great influence on so many musicians and what a beautiful thing, but I'm also curious
00:42:00
Speaker
what you think, you know, you wrote these St. Thomas and Olio and these tunes that have become jazz standards, right, that are played at jam sessions all the time and then to the level of people that transcribe your solos and they
00:42:15
Speaker
and they play your solos and they practice them over and over again. And I'm curious, is that something that you think is, is it, I don't know, not flattering, is that something that you think is a positive thing and that you're proud of? Or do you think it's, I wonder if it's a little strange that, you know, 50 years later, 20 year old kids are transcribing the solos that you did. What that feels like. And if you think that's a positive thing or a negative thing for the course of jazz.
00:42:46
Speaker
Well, for the course of jazz, that's... You know, I'm too... Yeah, maybe that's... Not that you have to be the ambassador for jazz. I guess just maybe on a personal level, then. Well, on a personal level, it's flattering, of course. Okay. And I don't take it too seriously because when I started out, there were a lot of...
00:43:14
Speaker
We all had our idols and people we studied and tried to play like. Yep. And if we had books or if we had records, uh, you know, we, we, 78 revolutions, amended records and we used to slow them down so we could hear what Coleman Hawkins did. How he played a phrase, hot Charlie park and busy.
00:43:40
Speaker
So, you know, it's all good. It's all good. I have no problem with that because, you know, they don't have to be, it's just part of the education. Yep. Could you have ever imagined when you played, you know, some of those solos that 50 years later kids would be playing, there are people all over the world would be playing those solos note for note and talking about them? Well,
00:44:08
Speaker
I don't know how much that's true. It may be true to some extent, but I'd rather, personally, I'd rather not think about that. If it is, you know, I mean, I don't want to get a big head or a stupid head or a false head. I mean, good. I try not to want to think about that, really. I mean, if that's,
00:44:36
Speaker
if that's happening or one degree is happening, okay, then it's good. They're doing something good. It's better that they're doing bad than smoking cigarettes. So, you know, so I'll take the credit, but I am a person that I don't want to take credit for stuff in my life because my, my journey is, is just,
00:45:04
Speaker
You know, it's not completed. It's far from completed. So I hate to think about, oh, how much I've influenced somebody. Good, if I'm fine. But it's not about me. It's about the idea of trying to better yourself and trying to improve the craft you're doing of music, trying to sound if they can use something that
00:45:31
Speaker
I did, and oh yeah, I can use a sign. I don't like to think about it as from me. You know what I mean? And that's definitely not the way I want to go down, or the road I want to go down. No, no, I try to avoid that. Because it's not about me. It's about an aspect of life, how to get through life.
00:46:01
Speaker
Yeah. Practicing, trying to learn, trying to emulate where it's worthy of emulation. That's what it was. Not about me personally. I don't think about, oh, wow, gee, look, it's the last thing that I...
00:46:21
Speaker
I think about, thank God, I've learned that much in my life. Yeah, I understand that. And were you someone that set goals throughout your life? Was that an important thing for you? Or was living in the moment and just on a day-to-day working on your practicing? More of that, more more of that than setting goals here. But you know, that's individual. I don't think that's very important. In my life, I just
00:46:50
Speaker
go and try to go day by day. But if someone has the strength of mind to set a goal and achieve it, they're good. Everybody has their own personalities and stuff. In my case, no, I didn't do it that much. I just went day to day, as you said.
00:47:17
Speaker
If you could just impart some wisdom after all the experiences you've been through, and I know part of your message, which I get is just keep looking forward and not putting too much emphasis on reflection, but if you could just try to give a couple shreds of advice to a young musician coming up today, do you have anything you could say? Well, there's so many things
00:47:47
Speaker
uh don't feel limited uh you mean it's something i would tell them or you're telling me that no i'm telling you i don't feel limited oh you want me to go through everything you want take your time whatever you want well uh you know i do i want as a uh horn player i'd like to have uh
00:48:18
Speaker
students play their long tones as a horn player. And that might be something that relates to if you're playing percussion or something. But as a horn player, I think playing long tones is very important because for one thing, it gives you a chance to meditate on what you're doing. Instead of going fast enough, you're just
00:48:48
Speaker
Meditate on that one note. You know, it's like when they have a meditation, they say, oh, and all this stuff. That one slow note is very important. Within that note is a whole universe. So if there's somewhere they can slow themselves down in their studies and their practices and all this stuff,
00:49:17
Speaker
That would be something I think that I would feel comfortable in suggesting to other young players. Yeah, and it as well helps a player to really focus on sound and tone. Right. Everything. Everything. Great. Well, Sonny, I can't tell you how much I appreciate your time, man. Well, I hope you've gotten something out of it.
00:49:45
Speaker
I enjoyed it because it gives me a chance to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to
00:50:15
Speaker
You don't hear that. Everything is the opposite. Just run through life doing everything it has to do. Yeah, with everybody and their devices, their phones and the social media, people are just rushing all the time and from staring at the phones.
00:50:38
Speaker
Human interaction there's you know like you're saying that the level of depth and and human interaction on a personal level It's not that present out there unless you make an effort to make it happen sometimes, right? Make an effort to make it happen. Yeah because we realize that it might be this world might be all that it is to these people that are
00:51:06
Speaker
looking at the cell phones and doing this and every, but the world of the senses out here and all that, we, with a little reflection, meditation and a little help from the divine, you realize that it's more than this. You know, this is one little planet on the universe. I mean, and so,
00:51:37
Speaker
Hey, I'm not about this planet. I'm in this planet because I'm unraveling my karma. That's the only reason I'm here.
00:51:50
Speaker
Well, yeah, man, it was a pleasure to get to hang with you. Okay, well, congratulations on your work. Thank you. Yeah, I basically just published these interviews with musicians talking about these sort of things. And yeah, lots of people out there can just find them and listen to them. Right, right. Yeah. Well, that's wonderful because it's such a beautiful place.
00:52:18
Speaker
have some experiences like I've been so fortunate to have some spiritual experiences when it's the most satisfying celestial place to be. I mean, it's just, it beats everything else that I see out here in this world. I hear that, man. So I want to thank you.
00:52:44
Speaker
for giving me an opportunity to discuss these things with you. Yeah well truly the thanks goes to you and I hope we can connect at another point. Yes and so just keep up what you're doing and hey man you know as far as I can see man you're doing absolutely the right thing. Right on. I really appreciate that.
00:53:09
Speaker
Thank you so much, and I also want to shout out Terri and thank her for Terri Hinty for helping make this happen. Yeah, yeah, Terri's is very important to helping this stuff happen. Yeah, so big thanks to her and big thanks to you, and Sonny, be well, take good care, and like I said, hope we can connect again at some point. Okay, keep the faith, man.
00:53:34
Speaker
Once again, I want to give a huge thank you to Sunny Rollins for taking the time to have this conversation. I'd also like to thank his longtime publicist, Terri Hinty, for all her assistance to make this happen. And big ups to all of you, the listeners, for checking out the Torganic podcast. Please hit subscribe or leave a comment on iTunes or wherever you find your podcasts. And you can always find more info on Torganic or myself, David Bayless, at Torganic.com. Until next time, peace.
00:54:10
Speaker
you