Contributed by: Relix Magazine
Organization: Relix Magazine
Dated Posted: May 28, 2026
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Sonny Rollins has passed away. The saxophone colossus was one of the most innovative and influential performers in the history of jazz, spearheading new directions for the music as a bandleader and collaborator with other generational talents. He was 95.

A statement posted to Rollins’ website confirmed that he died at his home in Woodstock, N.Y. on Monday. The message quoted Rollins’ reflections on death: “I think when the creative person ends, he continues in the next existence. I’m a person who believes this life isn’t the be-all and end-all of everything. A spiritual person doesn’t feel like that.”

Walter Theodore Rollins was born in New York in 1930 and raised in Harlem, taking his nickname from his grandmother. Rollins took up the saxophone at age 7 and quickly found his place in the neighborhood’s musical flourishing in his adolescence, playing in his first combo in high school alongside Jackie McLean, Kenny Drew and Art Taylor. After graduating, he followed in the footsteps of his heroes, like Coleman Hawkins, and carved out a path for himself in New York’s jazz landscape, playing first for the singer Babs Gonzales and later with the likes of Bud Powell, J.J. Johnson and Miles Davis before he turned 20.