Sandy Brown Jazz

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Jazz As Art

Sonny Rollins

There Are Such Things

When you listen to music, you sometimes conjure images in your mind. Our Jazz As Art series invites you to listen to a piece of jazz and as it plays, scroll down the page and see which of the pieces of art I have chosen comes closest to the pictures in your mind. Hopefully, this will introduce you to recordings and art works you might not have spent time with before.

Sonny Rollins Work Time

This version of There Are Such Things comes from the Sonny Rollins album Work Time. The 'standard' by Stanley Adams, Abel Baer and George W. Meyer dates back to 1942 when it was performed by Tommy Dorsey's orchestra with vocals by Frank Sinatra and The Pied Pipers.

Work Time was recorded in 1955 with Sonny Rollins (tenor saxophone); Ray Bryant (piano); George Morrow (bass) and Max Roach (drums). It included three 'standards' - There's No Business Like Show Business, It's All Right With Me and There Are Such Things. The other two tracks are Billy Strayhorn's Raincheck and Sonny's own Paradox. Opinions on the album vary, but it is one of my favourite albums, accessible, lyrical and inventive.

The lyrics are a song of hope "A heart that's true / There are such things / A dream for two / There are such things ..... So have a little faith / And trust in what tomorrow brings / You'll reach a star / Because there are such things"

The pictures I have chosen interpret the title more widely, but play the tune, scroll down through the paintings and see what you think.

(I think this only really works if you spend time with each painting or scroll through them a few times)