New Copy
Free Life, Singing, SGM 01. length: 39:54. Solo sax and piano, Jack Wright; duo with the late drummer Marv Frank. This LP was recorded at home mostly under a loft bed in 1982, and includes pieces with theirrepressible Philadelphia ex-bebop drummer. Crude by today's engineering standards, this album represents all the drive and excitement of an experienced player who has come across a new way of playing: free improv. At the time, rumor had it that all one had to do to be taken seriously as a musician was to put out one recording, and Wright decided that, given the huge expense and his preference for live playing, one of these would be sufficient every ten years. Cover by Jack, and poem on saxophone on sleeve.
"The saxophonist's roots in jazz are still evident — the fourth (untitled) piece starts out with an involuntary nod toward Monk's "Criss Cross" — but are well camouflaged. The second and fifth tracks are duets on which Wright is joined by Philadelphia-based drummer Marv Frank, whose nifty brushwork, though not well served by the recording, recalls Han Bennink. Wright saw his work then as "a continuation of the sixties, keeping radical culture alive, slapping American white-bread culture in the face." Indeed, for raw energy and sheer commitment, Free Life, Singing is right up there with the wild early Parachute recordings of John Zorn and Eugene Chadbourne, and is just as well worth hunting down."---Dan Warburton, allmusic.com