Department of Music

The Free Bridge Quintet presents "Living Legend ", a concert featuring the music of Sonny Rollins, on Saturday, October 20 at 8 PM in Old Cabell Hall at the University of Virginia. 

Recognized as "the greatest living improviser", Sonny Rollins recorded over sixty albums as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. In the 1950s, he worked with Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, Horace Silver, and Charlie Parker. A number of his composition, including "Oleo", "Airegin" have become famous jazz standards, and his best selling records from "The Bridge" were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.  Through the 1980s to 90s, Sonny Rollins, the saxophone colossus, played around the world, "pursuing the combination of emotion, memory, thought, and aesthetic design with a command that allows him to achieve spontaneous grandiloquence." The Free Bridge Quintet will pay tribute to this living legend by interpreting his music through their own unique sound honed over twenty years of performing, recording, and arranging music together.

Over the past two decades, the Free Bridge Quintet has performed over forty concerts in Old Cabell Hall as well as many outreaches and community events.  Founded in 1997, it features Jeff Decker on saxophones, Robert Jospé on the drums, Peter Spaar on bass, John D’earth on trumpet and flugelhorn, and Butch Taylor on piano. The quintet has been a staple of not only the UVA and Charlottesville jazz scene but also the greater Central Virginia jazz scene for more than two decades. The quintet is known for its tributes to the giants of jazz including Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, and John Coltrane as well as presentations of its own innovative works.  The quintet has also performed with many internationally renowned guest artists such as Pat Metheny, Cyrus Chestnut, Kurt Rosenwinkel and John Abercrombie.

Tickets are $15 General, $13 for UVA Faculty & Staff, $5 for Students and Free for UVA Students who reserve in advance. Tickets can be purchased at the Arts Box Office at artsboxoffice.virginia.edu or by calling 434.924.3376.

Old Cabell Hall is located on the south end of UVA's historic lawn, directly opposite the Rotunda. Parking is available in the central grounds parking garage on Emmet Street, in the C1 parking lot off McCormick Rd, and in the parking lots at the UVA Corner.  Handicap parking is available in the small parking lot adjacent to Bryan Hall.

All programs are subject to change. For more information please call the McIntire Department of Music at 434.924.3052. For tickets please visit www.artsboxoffice.virginia.edu or by call 434.924.3376.

To see all the Jazz Events at UVA please visit https://music.virginia.edu/jazz-events