Chet Baker

Chet Baker – In Paris:1955-56 Vol. 2 (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:09:46 minutes | 652 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

The band arrived in Paris in September 55 – Dick Twardzik was 24, Jimmy Bond was 22, Peter Littman only 20 and Baker, for all his achievements, was just 25 – with his good looks still intact. It was the first time any of them had traveled outside North America.

Also involved in these European sessions were tenor sax Bobby Jaspar, and pianists René Urtreger, Raymond Fol, and Francy Boland. While on the five bonus tracks recorded in Los Angeles and arranged by Johnny Mandel, the personnel included: Bud Shank, Charlie Mariano, Pepper Adams and Russ Freeman.

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Chet Baker – In Paris 1955-56 (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:10:35 minutes | 658 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

The band arrived in Paris in September 55 – Dick Twardzik was 24, Jimmy Bond was 22, Peter Littman only 20 and Baker, for all his achievements, was just 25 – with his good looks still intact. It was the first time any of them had traveled outside North America.

Also involved in these European sessions were tenor sax Bobby Jaspar, and pianists René Urtreger, Raymond Fol, and Francy Boland. While on the five bonus tracks recorded in Los Angeles and arranged by Johnny Mandel, the personnel included: Bud Shank, Charlie Mariano, Pepper Adams and Russ Freeman.

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Chet Baker – In New York (1959/2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 44:57 minutes | 1,90 GB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Music Manager

Chet Baker’s West Coast cool comes to the Big Apple on Chet Baker in New York. The project would be Baker’s first — in a four album deal — with the Big Apple-based Riverside Records. The bicoastal artist incorporates his decidedly undernourished sound and laid-back phrasing into the styling of Al Haig (piano), Johnny Griffin (tenor sax), Paul Chambers (bass), and Philly Joe Jones (drums). The results are uniformly brilliant as Baker’s cool-toned solos fly and bop with authority around the equally impressive supporting soloists. Conversely, the same cohesive unity continues on the introspective numbers that are more akin to Baker’s California cool. Undoubtedly one of the charms of this collection is the distinct choice of material. Running the gamut from the relaxed and soothing “Polka Dots and Moonbeams” and equally serene “Blue Thoughts” at one end of the spectrum to the percolating and driving intensity of “Hotel 49” on the other.

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Chet Baker – Chet Baker Plays The Best Of Lerner And Loewe (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 43:25 minutes | 1,89 GB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Craft Recordings

This is one of the last Chet Baker (trumpet) long players recorded in the States prior to the artist relocating to Europe in the early ’60s. Likewise, the eight-tune collection was the final effort issued during his brief association with the Riverside Records imprint. The project was undoubtedly spurred on by the overwhelming success of the Shelly Manne-led combo that interpreted titles taken from the score to My Fair Lady (1956). In addition to becoming an instant classic, Manne’s LP was also among of the best-selling jazz platters of all time. While Baker and crew may have gained their inspiration from Manne, these readings are comparatively understated. That said, the timelessness of the melodies, coupled with the assembled backing aggregate, make Chet Baker Plays the Best of Lerner and Loewe (1959) a memorable concept album.

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Chet Baker – Chet Baker Live in London Volume II (2018)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:51:25 minutes | 1,11 GB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Ubuntu Music

For six evenings, from 28th March to 2nd April 1983, the John Horler Trio rhythm section supported the legendary trumpet player Chet Baker at The Canteen in London. For those who were fortunate enough to be there, these were magical shows. The rhythm section was tight and Chet was at the top of his game. The best of the six hours of music is presented here on ‘Live in London Volume II’ and has been restored and remastered to the highest quality.Jim Richardson, Chet’s bassist, asked him if he could record the shows for his personal enjoyment. Chet was only too happy to agree, and Jim managed to capture most of the performances on a SONY TCS 300 audiocassette recorder. Over the years, Jim selectively shared this astonishing music, and those who heard it encouraged him to find a way to release it to the public. However, a combination of factors precluded this from happening for 33 years, until Martin Hummel met Jim late one evening at Ronnie Scott’s. Jim’s story about the music and his unwavering desire to share this with the world caught Hummel’s attention. Together, they persevered and ultimately The Chet Baker Estate granted permission to release the material on the Ubuntu Music record label.These, just like the original ‘Live in London’ release, are exceptional performances of Baker at his best, with music that touches the head, the heart and the soul.

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Chet Baker – Chet (Remastered) (1959/2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 41:55 minutes | 920 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Craft Recordings

Chet is an album by jazz trumpeter Chet Baker first released in 1959. The record is sometimes subtitled “The Lyrical Trumpet of Chet Baker”. Chet features performances by Baker with flautist Herbie Mann, saxophonist Pepper Adams, pianist Bill Evans, guitarist Kenny Burrell, bassist Paul Chambers, and either Connie Kay or Philly Joe Jones on drums. It was recorded in December 1958 and January 1959 and released on the Riverside label.

Though Baker was by the late 1950s known as much for his singing as his trumpet playing, this album is entirely instrumental. It contains 9 standard ballads played in the styles of Hard Bop to Cool Jazz. The album is entirely devoted to explorations of the ballad mood, it includes considerable variety.

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Chet Baker – Baker’s Holiday (1965/2012)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 32:20 minutes | 1,29 GB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Verve Reissues

Mastering of this title was completed by Kevin Reeves at Sterling Sound NYC, using the original 1/4” analog stereo masters from the EmArcy Vault. The masters were played on a modified Studer A820 with Wolke Butterfly heads and converted to digital at 192kHz/24bit resolution using the DCS 904. All equalization and level setting was done in the analog domain using Sterling’s proprietary mastering systems.
Baker’s Holiday, a musical tribute to the legacy of Billie Holiday, is one of Chet Baker’s finest treasures. The session is highlighted with the fluegelhornist’s tender solos and blissful vocals. Backed by a stellar cast of musicians including pianist Hank Jones, drummer Connie Key, guitarist Everett Barksdale and more, this colorful outing is an elegant ten track masterpiece which features the hits “Easy Living,” “These Foolish Things (Remind Me Of You)” and “Mean To Me.”

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Chet Baker – At The Forum Theater (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 41:13 minutes | 679 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

Chet Baker was a primary exponent of the West Coast school of cool jazz in the early and mid-’50s. As a trumpeter, he had a generally restrained, intimate playing style and he attracted attention beyond jazz for his photogenic looks and singing. But his career was marred by drug addiction. Baker’s father, Chesney Henry Baker,Sr., was a guitarist who was forced to turn to other work during the Depression; his mother, Vera (Moser) Baker, worked in a perfumery. The family moved from Oklahoma to Glendale, CA, in 1940. As a child, Baker sang at amateur competitions and in a church choir. Before his adolescence, his father brought home a trombone for him, then replaced it with a trumpet when the larger instrument proved too much for him. He had his first formal training in music in junior high and later at Glendale High School, but would play largely by ear for the rest of his life. In 1946, when he was only 16 years old, he dropped out of high school and his parents signed papers allowing him to enlist in the army; he was sent to Berlin, Germany, where he played in the 298th Army Band. After his discharge in 1948, he enrolled at El Camino College in Los Angeles, where he studied theory and harmony while playing in jazz clubs, but he quit college in the middle of his second year. He re-enlisted in the army in 1950 and became a member of the Sixth Army Band at the Presidio in San Francisco. But he also began sitting in at clubs in the city and he finally obtained a second discharge to become a professional jazz musician. Baker initially played in Vido Musso’s band, then with Stan Getz. (The first recording featuring Baker is a performance of “Out of Nowhere” that comes from a tape of a jam session made on March 24, 1952, and was released on the Fresh Sound Records LP Live at the Trade Winds.) His break came quickly, when, in the spring of 1952, he was chosen at an audition to play a series of West Coast dates with Charlie Parker, making his debut with the famed saxophonist at the Tiffany Club in Los Angeles on May 29, 1952. That summer, he began playing in the Gerry Mulligan Quartet, a group featuring only baritone sax, trumpet, bass, and drums – no piano – that attracted attention during an engagement at the Haig nightclub and through recordings on the newly formed Pacific Jazz Records (later known as World Pacific Records), beginning with the 10″ LP Gerry Mulligan Quartet, which featured Baker’s famous rendition of “My Funny Valentine.” The Gerry Mulligan Quartet lasted for less than a year, folding when its leader went to jail on a drug charge in June 1953. Baker went solo, forming his own quartet, which initially featured Russ Freeman on piano, Red Mitchell on bass, and Bobby White on drums, and making his first recording as leader for Pacific Jazz on July 24, 1953. Baker was hailed by fans and critics and he won a number of polls in the next few years. In 1954, Pacific Jazz released Chet Baker Sings, an album that increased his popularity but alienated traditional jazz fans; he would continue to sing for the rest of his career. Acknowledging his chiseled good looks, nearby Hollywood came calling and he made his acting debut in the film Hell’s Horizon, released in the fall of 1955. But he declined an offer of a studio contract and toured Europe from September 1955 to April 1956. When he returned to the U.S., he formed a quintet that featured saxophonist Phil Urso and pianist Bobby Timmons. Contrary to his reputation for relaxed, laid-back playing, Baker turned to more of a bop style with this group, which recorded the album Chet Baker & Crew for Pacific Jazz in July 1956. Baker toured the U.S. in February 1957 with the Birdland All-Stars and took a group to Europe later that year. He returned to Europe to stay in 1959, settling in Italy, where he acted in the film Urlatori Alla Sbarra. Hollywood, meanwhile, had not entirely given up on him, at least as a source of inspiration, and in 1960, a fictionalized film biography of his life, All the Fine Young Cannibals, appeared with Robert Wagner in the starring role of Chad Bixby. Baker had become addicted to heroin in the 1950s and had been incarcerated briefly on several occasions, but his drug habit only began to interfere with his career significantly in the 1960s. He was arrested in Italy in the summer of 1960 and spent almost a year and a half in jail. He celebrated his release by recording Chet Is Back! for RCA in February 1962. (It has since been reissued as The Italian Sessions and as Somewhere Over the Rainbow.) Later in the year, he was arrested in West Germany and expelled to Switzerland, then France, later moving to England in August 1962 to appear as himself in the film The Stolen Hours, which was released in 1963. He was deported from England to France because of a drug offense in March 1963. He lived in Paris and performed there and in Spain over the next year, but after being arrested again in West Germany, he was deported back to the U.S. He returned to America after five years in Europe on March 3, 1964, and played primarily in New York and Los Angeles during the mid-’60s, having switched temporarily from trumpet to fl”ugelhorn. In the summer of 1966, he suffered a severe beating in San Francisco that was related to his drug addiction. The incident is usually misdated and frequently exaggerated in accounts of his life, often due to his own unreliable testimony. It is said, for example, that all his teeth were knocked out, which is not the case, though one tooth was broken and the general deterioration of his teeth led to his being fitted with dentures in the late ’60s, forcing him to retrain his embouchure. The beating was not the cause of the decline in his career during this period, but it is emblematic of that decline. By the end of the ’60s, he was recording and performing only infrequently and he stopped playing completely in the early ’70s. Regaining some control over his life by taking methadone to control his heroin addiction (though he remained an addict), Baker eventually mounted a comeback that culminated in a prominent New York club engagement in November 1973 and a reunion concert with Gerry Mulligan at Carnegie Hall in November 1974 that was recorded and released by Epic Records. By the mid-’70s, Baker was able to return to Europe and he spent the rest of his life performing there primarily, with occasional trips to Japan and periods back in the U.S., though he had no permanent residence. He attracted the attention of rock musicians, with whom he occasionally performed, for example adding trumpet to Elvis Costello’s recording of his anti-Falklands War song “Shipbuilding” in 1983. In 1987, photographer and filmmaker Bruce Weber undertook a documentary film about Baker. The following year, Baker died in a fall from a hotel window in Amsterdam after taking heroin and cocaine. Weber’s film, Let’s Get Lost, premiered in September 1988 to critical acclaim and earned an Academy Award nomination. In 1997, Baker’s unfinished autobiography was published under the title As Though I Had Wings: The Lost Memoir and the book was optioned by Miramax for a film adaptation. Baker’s drug addiction caused him to lead a disorganized and peripatetic life, his constant need for cash requiring him to accept many ill-advised recording offers, while his undependability prevented him from making long-term commitments to record labels. As a result, his discography is extensive and wildly uneven. – William Ruhlmann

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Chet Baker – Albert’s House (Remastered) (1969/2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 47:57 minutes | 469 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Beverly Hills Records

Albert’s House is a studio album by jazz trumpeter Chet Baker recorded in 1969 and released on the Beverley Hills label. The album features 11 compositions by Steve Allen who organised the recording date to assist Baker restart his career.

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Chet Baker – Chet Baker With Strings (1954/2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 46:02 minutes | 365 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

Chet Baker & Strings is an album by jazz trumpeter Chet Baker recorded in late 1953 and early 1954 and released on the Columbia label.

Lindsay Planer of Allmusic stated: “This release offers a unique glimpse of a young Chet Baker in a quintet setting, complemented by a nine-piece string section… The easygoing and otherwise winding strings support the cool bop like a kite in a March breeze — light, airy, and conspicuous only in altitude”.
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