Sonny Rollins - Freedom Suite

By 1958 Sonny Rollins was already able to claim the jazz high road as a tireless innovator who chose to test the mainstream's boundaries. Freedom Suite made his place in the vanguard all the more stable. It is credited as the first album-length jazz statement of the civil rights era.

The title track "Freedom Suite" is a winding, episodic piece, full of stair-climb segues and solos that seemed to be collective with drummer Max Roach. Political implications were fully externalized in the title, declaring Rollins's position on the burgeoning civil rights movement. Rollins didn't altogether give up the standards or show-tune repertoire on this record, as highlighted by Noel Coward's "Someday I'll Find You".

Heavyweight vinyl produced by Original Jazz Classics for Riverside Records in 2014. Lacquers cut at Well Made Music. Pressed at Rainbo Records.