Sonny Rollins, the tenor saxophonist whose combination of technical mastery, melodic invention and raw improvisational power made him one of the most consequential figures in jazz history, died Monday (May 25) at his home in Woodstock, New York. He was 95. His death was announced on his official website. Rollins had been living with pulmonary fibrosis.
His passing marks the end of a direct line to jazz’s post-war golden age. Rollins came of age alongside Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker — and outlived them all, spending the decades after their deaths as a living…