Free-jazz giant, David S. Ware, has died aged just 62. The New Jersey-based saxophonist had been plagued by poor health for many years, undergoing nearly a decade of dialysis treatment and, at the age of 60, a kidney transplant using an organ donated in response to an email appeal sent to 1,000 of his fans.

While Ware’s many admirers will mourn this premature loss, there’s comfort to be had from the fact that the two short years gained by surgery allowed him time to record some of his strongest work, including two astonishing albums by the heavyweight quartet, Planetary Unknown, featuring drummer Muhammad Ali, pianist Cooper-Moore and long-time collaborator, bassist William Parker.

Ware came up through the New York loft scene of the 1970s, playing as a sideman with Cecil Taylor and Andrew Cyrille. In the early-90s he formed his acclaimed quartet featuring Parker, pianist Matthew Shipp and a revolving drum stool filled at various times by the likes of Whit Dickey, Susie Ibarra and Guillermo E. Brown. Albums like 1997’s Go See The World confirmed the group’s position as one of the pre-eminent free-jazz groups on the planet.

Ware, a long-term devotee of Transcendental Meditation, commanded a powerful persona that soared above a lifetime of earthly travails (including14 years spent working as a cab driver in New York City), manifesting in his playing as a deeply spiritual, tumultuous sincerity that made him the late-20th/early-21st century’s most convincing heir to the ecstatic free-jazz of Coltrane and Ayler.

– Daniel Spicer