"The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD, Third Edition" (perhaps the best book of its kind) lists a total of 43 Rollins albums in print.

Now we have "Sonny Rollins: The Freelance Years" (Riverside), a boxed set that contains everything Rollins recorded for Riverside and Contemporary Records. There's little question that Rollins was a giant on the tenor saxophone during his prime. These 58 tracks were recorded during one of Rollins most creative periods, from December 1956 through October 1958.

Its difficult to believe that these sounds are more than four decades old, for Rollins sounds as modern as next week's new phenom. He was just 26 when he joined the Riverside label. When the first albums began to appear, critics were ecstatic for the most part. Many asserted that Rollins was the tenor of those times.

Part of the excitement about these recordings was the fact that Rollins had taken a two-year sabbatical from public performance. Critics were ready for him and they weren't disappointed. Rollins here shows his outstanding aptitude in playing tenor, and he demonstrates his increasing abilities as a composer. Two of his earliest long-form performances "Way Out West" and "Freedom Suite," are in this package and both are exceptional.

Rollins wore the robes of his apt title, the "Saxophone Colossus," and these discs demonstrate to the uninitiated that he was fully worthy of the appellation. In remastering the original tapes, engineers have made the discs alive and with few noticeable evidences of the materials advancing age.

Rollins tenor has been carefully restored to pristine condition. Only occasionally do piano solos convince the listener that this material originated a long, long time ago.

Disc one opens with four delightful excursions into the fantastic innovator, Thelonious Monk. This album was released with Monk as the leader and its obvious that Monk pushes the session along. There are three Monk compositions: "Brilliant Corners," "Ba-Lue Bolivar Ba-Lues-Are" and "Pannonica." Rollins receives ample time to expand, but its still obvious that Monk remains the bossman.

Johnny Mercers novelty song, "I'm an Old Cowhand," is heard twice, with Rollins able to build solid solos from a catchy but inconsequential tune. Rollins does lovely things with the ballad, "There Is No Greater Love."

Disc Two opens with a gorgeous reading of the Duke Ellington favorite, "Solitude."

Trumpeter Kenny Dorham was the leader for four excellent songs, "Falling in Love with Love," "My Old Flame," (done earlier in a comic manner by the deliciously wacky Spike Jones band, along with a Dorham composition called "LaVilla." Finally, theres a fine 12-minute ramble on the ever beautiful, "I'll Remember April," a song adapted in hundreds of versions by jazz groups over several decades.

Discs three and four contain 10 songs from a session with singer/actress Abbey Lincoln. The choices include some excellent compositions, such as "Porgy," "Happiness is a Thing Called Joe," and "I Must Have That Man." Theres an excellent Billy Holiday thing called "Don't Explain."

Lincoln is an excellent singer who never reached much commercial success. What renown she achieved was sometimes attributed to her marriage to world-class drummer Max Roach. But you only have to listen to her sing a few songs to realize that she didn't need to ride anybody's coattails.

The problem with this assemblage of 10 tunes from Lincoln is that most of the time you're hearing her and not the man of the hour, Sonny Rollins.

Other than those few caveats, "Sonny Rollins: The Freelance Years" will attract tenor fanatics and anyone interested in an important document of one of the great jazz musicians of the 20th century.