Sonny Rollins and Sonny Clark: Unissued Outtakes, 3

We continue now listening to the “session reel” (the unedited recordings, in order) from the only studio meeting of Sonny Rollins and pianist Sonny Clark. It took place during the early morning hours of June 12, 1957, with Percy Heath, bass, and Roy Haynes, drums. To find the first two essays in this series, please use the Index. The next song that they recorded was “Toot, Toot, Tootsie (Goo' Bye!)” That’s how it is spelled on the original 1922 sheet music:

Here is the complete sheet music

Toot Toot Tootsie

8.87MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

The song was especially associated with Al Jolson (it was not one of his Blackface minstrel numbers), and you may have seen him sing it in the 1927 film The Jazz Singer. It was certainly not a “standard” among modern jazz artists. Rollins has always been noted for choosing “corny” old songs and making them fresh, and this is a classic example.

The engineer Jack Higgins—we introduced him in the first essay—announces that this is the third selection to be recorded, and the first take of it, and then, as was his habit, he says “Speak,” meaning, “Go.” Then the quartet gives a fine performance, but, typical of Rollins, at the end he says “Okay, let’s do another one.” Let’s listen to this unissued take, and enjoy:

Higgins announces Take 2, but there is some issue and he asks them to start again. He says “Still rolling,” to indicate that he won’t count this brief “false start” as a take:

So they start again on Take 2, and it sounds fine. Haynes is exciting and vibrant, as always. At the end, somebody—I think it’s Clark— says something that is not quite audible (he’s not near the microphone). Here’s Take 2:

After some discussion that was not recorded, they decide to do another take. Higgins announces Take 3 but it’s only a false start. Evidently, Rollins had just asked for a clean break in the middle of the theme, and they were really just trying it out, not intending to do a full take. The break is at 0:31, and shortly after that, you can hear Roy say “Ah,” as in “I get it.” They stop and Sonny says “Okay—still rolling?”

Apparently, Higgins was not “still rolling”—that is, he preferred to give the next take the new number 4. But the musicians were apparently not ready, and nobody plays.

This was followed by the real Take 4 (unless something is missing on my tape), which is the one that was included on the album. Here it is, nicely mastered for release:

More to come!

All the best,
Lewis

P.S. We owe thanks to James Accardi, who is knowledgeable about jazz and about old audio, for removing some hiss and making improvements to the speed and pitch of these files.