Jumping in and out of the business based upon his own personal aspirations probably kept Sonny Rollins from burning out at a relatively young age. And considering that during the first decade of his career he performed alongside some of the better known bop players to ever record, it’s no small feat that Rollins was able to persist decade after decade. What’s even more astounding is that his career began as a series of highlights, maintained those stunning moments during the middle portion of his recordings and continue on today as he maintains a sporadic touring schedule even while pushing towards 80 years of age.

Having his first composition recorded by trombonist J.J. Johnson was an auspicious beginning. Rollins really couldn’t have asked for anything better. It’s also curious to note that while Johnson was and will remain the most respected bop player on his instrument, the stylistic similarities between him and Rollins aren’t merely coincidental.

While Johnson was the most adept at working the trombone into a bop setting, his playing remained palatable to a wide audience and eschewed any purposefully difficult flourishes. Rollins too ignored the more academic approaches to music and instead was able to craft a catalog that at once satisfies the jazz cognoscenti, but endears itself to passing fans of the genre.

There’re endless remarkable dates that Rollins set down over the years – and specifically during the ‘50s and ‘60s. Work Time, though, is one of the more enjoyable, if not traditional and coy sets from that time period. Recorded in 1955, Rollins enlisted the likes of Ray Bryant, George Morrow and Max Roach to accompany him on his lone original and four renditions of well known melodies.

The shortest track, clocking in at five minutes, is Rollins’own “Paradox.” Beginning with a melody fit for whistling, the sax player has a go at the main figure a few times as Roach augments his drumming to signal a time shift while Rollins gets to his first solo. There aren’t any great revelatory bursts of genius represented over the track’s short life span. What Rollins does give listeners, though, is enough personality and pitch perfect tone as to render the composition in positive terms.

Elsewhere, the date leader and his backing group get through some Irving Berlin, Billy Strayhorn and Cole Porter. And while those names are all too familiar to folks that truck in ‘50s jazz of any kind, the tracks settled upon here aren’t the ones so commonly dispensed by groups from the era. Surely, “There’s No Business Like Show Business” didn’t need another run through, but when Rollins leads his band through Porter’s “It’s Alright with Me,” it seems as if there couldn’t be a more exciting version of the song in anyone’s song book.

When Rollins gets all up-tempo and gains his footing, there aren’t too many sax players that are his equal – before his time, his contemporaries or folks that playing in his wake. The date leader may have not been a part of the next evolution in jazz, but his dogged consistency and inspirational persistence in a craft that today isn’t regarded too highly is more than admirable. So is Work Time.