It’s historical albums like this that make you regret being a Jazz Snob.–
I was just starting to get interested in jazz , and my “cool guy” mentor turned me on to guys like Clifford Brown, Miles Davis, Freddie Hubbard…you get the picture. He adamantly dissuaded me from West Coast guys like Chet Baker, so I never heard anything by him with Mulligan or Freeman until years later.
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Back in these days, there were frequent ads in the papers about Chet Baker playing somewhere nearby, but I figured “why bother? He’s a drugged out has-been” and so refused to see him perform in concert.
Boy, was that a regretful mistake.
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These recently discovered studio recordings from the justly named label Jazz Detective (who gave us those delicious Ahmad Jamal albums last year) show that Chet Baker, in 1979, was still one of the most lyrical and swinging trumpet players around. The two dates on this 2 disc set are from April 10 and November 9, 1979 in the VARA Studio in happening Hilversum, Holland. For April, he’s baked by Phil Markowitz/p, Jean-Louis Rassinfosse/b and Charles Rice, while the November cast is Frans Elsen/p, Victor Kaihatu/b and Eric Ineke/dr. Both serve Baker well, but Baker serves the music superbly.
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His horn is the equivalent of Stan Getz’s tenor in terms of mellifluence, fluffy but not fluffing on a sexy samba like “Beautiful Black Eyes”, clear and sublime for pastoral take of “Nardis” and clear, hip and crisp on “The Best Thing For You”. He could still flex his brass muscles, digging in on “Old Devil Moon” and a testosterone’d read of Miles Davis’ “Down”.. Vocally, he was still the master of vulnerable restraint, lonely on a sparkling “ Oh, You Crazy Moon”, as sharp as an Italian suit for “Candy” and wide eyed on “My Ideal”. No audible wear and tear here.
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Baker was constantly (and unjustly) compared to Miles Davis, as they were contemporaries, only a few years apart in age. If you put this 50 year old Baker against Miles of the same age with something like Panagea or Agharta, there is not doubt in retrospect who I would have enjoyed more in concert. Baker was COOKIN’, WALKIN’, RELAXIN’ and WORKIN’! DIG!
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