Saxophone Colossus: Don Aliquo Plays the Music of Sonny Rollins
Friday, September 18th, 2026, 7:30 PM
Nashville Jazz Workshop
Don Aliquo and friends present a musical exploration of the music of tenor titan Theodore "Sonny" Rollins. Expect musical fireworks as the group examines his career from its earliest sides to his final recordings.
Few musicians ever earn a nickname as grand as "Saxophone Colossus," and fewer still live up to it the way Sonny Rollins did. Born in Harlem in 1930 to a family with Caribbean roots, Rollins came up in the crucible of bebop, playing alongside Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Miles Davis, and the Clifford Brown–Max Roach Quintet before he was thirty. His 1956 masterpiece Saxophone Colossus — home to the irresistible calypso "St. Thomas" — announced a voice unlike anyone else's: muscular and tender, playful and profound, capable of building an entire universe out of a single melody.
Rollins was jazz's great improviser, famous for spinning long, fearless, unaccompanied solos that could turn a standard inside out. He was also a restless perfectionist. At the height of his fame he walked away to practice alone on New York's Williamsburg Bridge for two years, returning in 1962 with the aptly titled album The Bridge. Over a career spanning seven decades he earned a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, the National Medal of Arts, and Kennedy Center Honors, and was celebrated to the end as one of the most important and influential musicians the music has ever known. Sonny Rollins died on May 25, 2026, at the age of 95. This performance is offered in that spirit — a celebration of a colossus whose sound still echoes.
Leading the tribute is Don Aliquo, a saxophonist whose playing has been described as "smooth as silk... with an unfailing feel for breath and phrasing." Professor of Saxophone and Jazz Studies at Middle Tennessee State University and a Selmer and Vandoren artist, Aliquo has released six solo projects and performed and recorded with a who's-who of the music, including Gary Burton, Greg Osby, Rufus Reid, Roger Humphries, and the late Beegie Adair. With a hand-picked band of friends, he'll trace Rollins' remarkable arc across the evening — from the early bebop sides through the calypso classics to the last recordings — with the fire, wit, and invention the music demands.
Show time is 7:30 PM; doors open at 7:00 PM.
ABOUT DON ALIQUO
Don Aliquo's playing has been described as "smooth as silk... with an unfailing feel for breath and phrasing," always zeroed in on what he's describing. His most recent release, Growth, explores new territory with intriguing original compositions and ample solo space — an electrifying modern outing with one foot in the future and one in the tradition. He has released six solo projects, including Sun and Shield, which features veteran jazz masters Rufus Reid, Jim McNeely, and Obed Calvaire, and has appeared as a collaborator and sideman on many more. Notable collaborations include a duo recording with pianist Michael Jefry Stevens, quartet recordings with Roger Humphries and the late Beegie Adair, and a recording with his mentor, Pittsburgh tenor stalwart Don Aliquo Sr. He has performed and recorded with Gary Burton, Greg Osby, Rufus Reid, Roger Humphries, Harold Danko, Adam Nussbaum, Donald Brown, Pete Christlieb, Scott Robinson, and Bobby Shew. Don is Professor of Saxophone and Jazz Studies at Middle Tennessee State University and a Selmer and Vandoren artist.