Were you able to get work right away?
Well, get work right away…How do I respond to that? I did get work, because I had a little reputation; guys knew about me from New York. I had made some records with Miles Davis, and those guys had heard me play and they all liked me. So I got some work, and sometimes I didn’t get any work. But it was great fun. Things couldn’t have been better; great musicians out there.
Those were the early days of improvisation?
The LP and all that were coming in, so guys were able to hear long improvisations, not just two choruses. That was sort of the beginning of that kind of music.
You recorded with others before recording as a leader under your own name.
I loved playing with all those guys, because I was sort of the youngest guy on the block. The first guy that I recorded with was the trombonist J. J. Johnson – and he recorded one of my tunes, as a matter of fact. I think I went with Miles in 1948 or ’49; it’s a little jumbled in my mind. I played opposite Miles’s band. We had a little small band, trio, and Miles was playing with an all-star group and we sort of opened for them.
I was playing down at the famous Minton’s Playhouse in New York, and the guy was putting on these concerts up in the Bronx, and he heard me and said, “Hey, kid, you want to come on up and open up?” We were opening for Miles, and Miles heard me and said, “Man, c’mon, join my band.” So I joined Miles early on. That was way back in ’49, and that’s when I got to play and met a lot of guys.
I had played with Monk before that. I used to practice out at Monk’s house in New York when I was still in high school: myself and a trumpet player that used to play with me, Lowell Lewis. He went out on the road with Monk for a week…He had to miss school for a week. It was fantastic, and he got me with Monk.
I was getting to know all those guys at that time. I played with Miles; Coltrane was playing with Miles at that time; Kenny Clark, the great drummer. I met all those guys, and I was playing with them. I did some recording with them. Because if you were good enough to play with those guys, you were good enough to record with them – because it wasn’t apprentice school. You had to be good enough to play. If they wanted you to play with them, you’d better be good.
It reminds me, when I was playing with Bud Powell, I made a record with Bud Powell. We were in the studio playing music and I made a mistake, and Powell shot a look over at me, man, and I never made that mistake again because I said, “Man, this guy’s going to strangle me or something.” That’s it, you had to do it right. And you were supposed to, because these guys were the top of the line.
How did you get there, that good at that young an age?
When my mother first got me an alto saxophone, I was about 7 years old, 7 or 8, and boy, I took that horn in the room and I was practicing, playing, and my mother would be, “Sonny, Sonny, come out to eat dinner.” And I just loved music, and I love the saxophone. My favorite was Louis Jordan; I had all of his records. So, practice: That’s how I got to be where I was.
Of course, music is something you have to have a talent for. Every guy in my block where we grew up, we all wanted to be jazz musicians, because jazz musicians were so cool. They show up with sunglasses, had all the girls…so we all wanted to be. But I had the talent. If it was just who wanted to be there, they all would have been there. So music is a thing where you have to have a certain gift. That’s all I can say. I had the gift.
With Monk, he had heard me playing in a little club in New York in Harlem many years ago, and then later on I played with him when I was in high school. So I had a certain gift, which I don’t take credit for. I’m glad people want to shower me with praise, that’s fine. But that’s a gift from above. I was born with that, I didn’t acquire that. I adhered to it and did the best I could with it, tried to make it work. I could have done more, but at least I did a certain amount – enough to get better at it.
Everybody heard, “Oh, yeah, I got this young kid, Sonny.” And I went with Bud Powell, which was the pinnacle. Bud Powell was the real Beethoven of jazz. In fact, a guy is writing a big story about Bud. He was a really fantastic musician, and Duke Ellington was a big fan of Bud Powell. So Bud got me the date, and I played with the great Fats Navarro. So I was there. They selected you, so you’d better play.
Then you started leading a band, doing your own dates. What did that do for you?
The thing is this: When I played with Miles, I had my band, the youngsters’ band. We were kids, had young bebop bands, and somehow I was always the leader. I don’t know if that happened purposely. I’m not that kind of a guy…I think I’m more introspective, but I was a leader and I had a band, and so being a “bandleader,” quote, was something which was not foreign to me.
After I got famous, I was able…You know, my mother comes from the Virgin Islands, and I heard a lot of Caribbean music as a kid. But in jazz, I couldn’t come out as a Caribbean player; that’s a different genre.
Actually all music is one, if you can get to that point; all music is the same. But when I was playing with Bud and Monk and these guys, I was a sideman, so I didn’t get to play anything Caribbean – stuff that was easy for me to play. As I got more famous myself and had my own band, then I could play Caribbean music… “St. Thomas,” exactly…But I couldn’t come out playing “St. Thomas” until I reached a certain credibility in mainstream jazz. When I got to be a leader myself, I could do a lot of stuff.
Of course I’m standing on the shoulders of these people. I don’t want to imply I did anything without learning from Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Monk, Miles – all these guys I had the opportunity to learn from. And in that sense, I’m eternally blessed and grateful that I had that chance.
