JOHN WRIGHT TRIO - SOUTH SIDE SOUL

SOUTH SIDE SOUL

JOHN WRIGHT TRIO

SONGWRITER: ESMOND EDWARDS

COUNTRY: U. S.A.

ALBUM: SOUTH SIDE SOUL

LABEL: PRESTIGE

GENRE: JAZZ

YEAR: 1961

 

         John Albert Wright (September 7, 1934 - December 15, 2017) was an American jazz pianist who was successful in Chicago, especially during the 1960s.

        John Wright was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1934. His family moved to Chicago in 1936 where his mother, an evangelistic preacher, founded a church at which he began to play piano by the age of seven. He attended Wendell Phillips High School and played organ at the Christian Hope M.B. Baptist Church before enlisting in the military in 1952 where he was stationed in Germany with the 7th Army Special Services and developed his skills in playing jazz.

    Upon his return to Chicago in 1955, Wright performed in the local jazz scene in clubs and in 1960 began to record for the New York jazz label Prestige at the Van Gelder Studio producing a total of five albums for the label between 1960 and 1962.

        Wright continued to perform on the Chicago club scene and worked as a librarian at the Cook County Jail from the mid 1980s, until 1999. In 1994, he recorded a final álbum Wright Changes & Choices.

        In 2008, Wright was inducted into the Wendell Phillips High School Hall of Fame, and in 2009 he was awarded the Walter Dyett Lifetime Achievement Award by the Jazz Institute of Chicago. Wright died in late 2017, and tribute concerts were performed in his memory at the 2018 Chicago Jazz Festival and 2018 Hyde Park Jazz Festival.

      South Side Soul is the debut album by jazz pianista John Wright which was recorded in 1960 and released on the Prestige label.

         Scott Yanow of Allmusic states, "John Wright, who is now quite obscure, recorded five albums during 1960-62 that emphasized the soulful side of hard bop. [...] Wright performs seven of his originals, all of which have something to do with Chicago. [...] Wright plays soulfully while swinging."