The Piano Couldn’t be Salvaged

Terry Gross interviewed Sonny Rollins on her radio show Fresh Air. Rollins talked with his somber hoarse voice about lving in Tribeca and having to move out of his apartment after 9/11. “I left my piano there, ” he said, “Monk played that and Dizzy and many others.” Rollins explained that he feared toxins from the explosions from the towers and the air that was polluted had seeped into the piano. So when he moved out, he left it there, with many of his books, records and other treasures from a lifetime, 30 years, in a 39th floor apartment in New York.

Rollins has just issued a CD recorded at a concert held in Boston four days after the event. While people were still shell shocked, there is a renewal in the playing, a kind of defiance, that is refreshing.