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Sonny's Bridge: Jazz Legend Sonny Rollins Finds His Groove by Keith Mallett, Barry Wittenstein
kelleemoye's review against another edition
4.0
The rhythm of the writing in Sonny’s Bridge automatically gets you toe tapping while reading. It captures the feeling and flow of jazz which truly sets the stage for Sonny’s story because in the end this is the story of Sonny Rollins and his path to finding his musical voice.
In addition to the rhythm in the writing, the illustrators images bring the words to life using movement, color, and line to show the power of the music.
Together, the words and music bring Sonny’s story to the readers in a way that will illuminate his struggles and his triumphs.
Full review with teaching tools: http://www.unleashingreaders.com/?p=19519
In addition to the rhythm in the writing, the illustrators images bring the words to life using movement, color, and line to show the power of the music.
Together, the words and music bring Sonny’s story to the readers in a way that will illuminate his struggles and his triumphs.
Full review with teaching tools: http://www.unleashingreaders.com/?p=19519
mallen8509's review against another edition
4.0
This is a picture book for upper elementary students or higher. If you are reading this book in a class setting, students will make more connections to this book if you introduce them to jazz first. BrainPOP has a great video about Jazz that you could use. Students will understand the way the author has written the book much better if they have that background knowledge.
fernandie's review against another edition
3.0
Note: I accessed a digital review copy of this book through Edelweiss.
michelle_neuwirth_gray9311's review against another edition
4.0
While the text was well done and interesting, I absolutely loved the illustrations!
backonthealex's review against another edition
5.0
What better way is there to introduce young readers to some of the world's greatest artists than through a well-done picture book? And Sonny's Bridge is a perfect example of that.
Walter Theodore "Sonny" Rollins was born in 1930 when the Harlem Renaissance was in full swing - for musicians, that would be literally. Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie and Glenn Miller were some of the jazz greats during Sonny's childhood, popularizing a new swing sound. And Sonny already knew that being a jazz musician was in his future as he practiced his saxophone at home in the closet.
Later, during WWII, Sonny continued to practice, listening to a new generation of musicians, people like Charlie "Bird" Parker and John "Dizzy" Gillespie as they perfected a new sound called bebop. But even though he was too young to join the army, he also began to see the inequalities around him and to demonstrate for equal rights for all African Americans and to end Jim Crow laws.
Sonny and his saxophone Henrietta soon began to get some gigs, playing in "...fancy joints and two-bit joints./Two shows a night, two sets per show" and to gain so much recognition, he found himself playing in Carnegie Hall with other jazz legends.
But somehow, despite his success, at 29 years old, Sonny was dissatisfied and decided to leave the jazz world behind, believing that his name was bigger than his talent, that his fame had come too soon. His life, he decides, needed an intermission.
But as Sonny continued to play, he realized he also needed to finds a place to practice that wouldn't bother the neighbors, a place where he could play as much and as loudly as he needed to, a place that was right in from of his eyes - the Williamsburg Bridge, connecting Brooklyn and Manhattan. It was the perfect place to reconnect with himself: "seeking refuge and sol-i-tude. Finding inspiration, finding himself/in the echoes of the echoes of the echoes" on the walkway of the bridge.
Eventually, more confident in his sound and himself, Sonny goes back into the recording studio where his music, "enters a new dimension: his subconscious" and within two weeks, a new album with a new sound is produced and appropriately named "The Bridge." Sonny is back and better than ever!
Sonny's Bridge is such a perfectly wrought picture book for older readers. Wittenstein has written the text in a free verse style that resembles a jazzy bebob composition that Sonny might have played himself, capturing all the energy of bebop, and all the passion of this musical genius.
Mallett's digitally illustrations are bold and vibrantly colorful, carrying their own sense of rhythm that compliments both the free verse text and the excitement of the jazz scene to which Sonny belonged over the course of 40 years, from his years as a young listener and learner to his years as a self-assured musician and creator.
I also loved the design of this book as well as the content. Maybe it's because I'm old enough to remember buying record albums before cassettes, CDs, and now Vinyl. Albums always had a colorful cardboard jacket, and inside of it, the record was usually held in a brown paper sleeve with a hole in the center that showed the record label. And that is exactly the sense you get when you open Sonny's Bridge. And in keeping with musical traditon, Sonny's biography is set up like a gig itself - with a first set, and intermission, and a second set that harmonizes perfectly with Sonny's life.
There is plenty of back matter for further exploration into Sonny's life and music, and an excellent curriculum guide is available from the publisher, Charlesbridge, HERE
This book is recommended for readers age 6+
This book was sent to my by the published, Charlesbridge Publishing
Walter Theodore "Sonny" Rollins was born in 1930 when the Harlem Renaissance was in full swing - for musicians, that would be literally. Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie and Glenn Miller were some of the jazz greats during Sonny's childhood, popularizing a new swing sound. And Sonny already knew that being a jazz musician was in his future as he practiced his saxophone at home in the closet.
Later, during WWII, Sonny continued to practice, listening to a new generation of musicians, people like Charlie "Bird" Parker and John "Dizzy" Gillespie as they perfected a new sound called bebop. But even though he was too young to join the army, he also began to see the inequalities around him and to demonstrate for equal rights for all African Americans and to end Jim Crow laws.
Sonny and his saxophone Henrietta soon began to get some gigs, playing in "...fancy joints and two-bit joints./Two shows a night, two sets per show" and to gain so much recognition, he found himself playing in Carnegie Hall with other jazz legends.
But somehow, despite his success, at 29 years old, Sonny was dissatisfied and decided to leave the jazz world behind, believing that his name was bigger than his talent, that his fame had come too soon. His life, he decides, needed an intermission.
But as Sonny continued to play, he realized he also needed to finds a place to practice that wouldn't bother the neighbors, a place where he could play as much and as loudly as he needed to, a place that was right in from of his eyes - the Williamsburg Bridge, connecting Brooklyn and Manhattan. It was the perfect place to reconnect with himself: "seeking refuge and sol-i-tude. Finding inspiration, finding himself/in the echoes of the echoes of the echoes" on the walkway of the bridge.
Eventually, more confident in his sound and himself, Sonny goes back into the recording studio where his music, "enters a new dimension: his subconscious" and within two weeks, a new album with a new sound is produced and appropriately named "The Bridge." Sonny is back and better than ever!
Sonny's Bridge is such a perfectly wrought picture book for older readers. Wittenstein has written the text in a free verse style that resembles a jazzy bebob composition that Sonny might have played himself, capturing all the energy of bebop, and all the passion of this musical genius.
Mallett's digitally illustrations are bold and vibrantly colorful, carrying their own sense of rhythm that compliments both the free verse text and the excitement of the jazz scene to which Sonny belonged over the course of 40 years, from his years as a young listener and learner to his years as a self-assured musician and creator.
I also loved the design of this book as well as the content. Maybe it's because I'm old enough to remember buying record albums before cassettes, CDs, and now Vinyl. Albums always had a colorful cardboard jacket, and inside of it, the record was usually held in a brown paper sleeve with a hole in the center that showed the record label. And that is exactly the sense you get when you open Sonny's Bridge. And in keeping with musical traditon, Sonny's biography is set up like a gig itself - with a first set, and intermission, and a second set that harmonizes perfectly with Sonny's life.
There is plenty of back matter for further exploration into Sonny's life and music, and an excellent curriculum guide is available from the publisher, Charlesbridge, HERE
This book is recommended for readers age 6+
This book was sent to my by the published, Charlesbridge Publishing
bethmitcham's review
4.0
Lovely picture book that focuses on the gap years Rollins spent playing his saxophone on a bridge to ground himself before returning to fame and fortune. The words are lyrical and evocative of Jazz (with some be bops thrown in for extra sauce) but the pictures are the true star, smoky and blue like the music they depict.
Now that the 2019 YA Cybils nonfiction pushed me onto Spotify I try to turn on music when I read a biography of a musician. Reading this to the sounds of "The Bridge" made it even better.
Now that the 2019 YA Cybils nonfiction pushed me onto Spotify I try to turn on music when I read a biography of a musician. Reading this to the sounds of "The Bridge" made it even better.
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