Chet Baker "Chet Is Back!" (1962)

Chet Is Back!
release date: Jan. 1962
format: digital
[album rate: 4 / 5]

Studio album by Chet Baker. It's one of his most well-renowned albums, and I think it's more than good, only, it's not the style that first comes to my mind when I'm thinking of Chet Baker. This is great jazz bop, which is a style much more in a field of John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Stan Getz, and Charlie Mingus. Here, Chet shows how he's more than capable of that style as well. And well, I guess all great jazz artists just had to play music according to that style at some point from the mid 50s to mid 60s. It also contains one or two tracks in his real trademark: cool jazz but no vocal jazz or that fine combo of easy listening and standards that I love when played by Chet. The album's title refers to the fact that Chet had spent almost a year and a half in prison in Italy because of possession of drugs.

Chet Baker

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Chet Baker (birth name: Chesney Henry Baker; Dec. 23, 1929 - May 13, 1988), was born in Yale, Oklahoma, USA, and died in Amsterdam, The Netherlands some 58 years later. He's one of my absolute favorite jazz artists alongside Ella Fitzgerald, Etta James, Billie Holiday, Dexter Gordon, and Stan Getz. He had a highly original style, which was expressed in his brilliant soft and fragile singing voice and the tender melancholic beauty of his horn. Chet lived a hard life with alcohol and drug addiction which considerably shortened his life. He is a one the biggest jazz artists of the 1950s and 1960s, and is perhaps mostly known for his restrained playing style and influence on the foundation of cool jazz, as well as his fragile singing voice. In the 50s and 60s he was a male icon due to his photogenic looks. His trumpet career was boosted when he played with The Gerry Mulligan Quartet feat. Gerry Mulligan (baritone sax), Chet Baker (trumpet), Larry Bunker (drums), Carson Smith (bass). In the mid-50s he was promoted alongside Frank Sinatra and also had a film role in 1955 but refused to go further in an acting career. He spent many years travelling and playing in Europe in the '60s. In 1966 he was brutally beaten up in a drug related incident in San Francisco, and from the early 1970s he mostly played and lived in Europe. He ended his life after a fall from a window in Amsterdam - presumably as a result from taking both heroin and cocaine.

Chet Baker at the end of his career, and as a young photogenic star

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Charles Mingus "Mingus Ah Um" (1959)

Mingus Ah Um
release date: Sep. 14, 1959
format: vinyl (1987 remaster) / digital (2009 reissue)
[album rate: 4 / 5]
producer: Teo Macero
label: CBS Records - nationality: USA

Studio album by Charles Mingus originally released on Columbia - here in the digitally remastered series 'CBS Jazz Masterpieces'.
The album is an essential part of any jazz collection.

[ allmusic.com, Rolling Stone 5 / 5, Popmatters 4,5 / 5 stars ]

Jacques Brel "Quand on n'a que l'amour" (1957)

Quand on n'a que l'amour
release date: 1957
format: cd (2003 remaster)
[album rate: 3,5 / 5]

Track highlights: 1. "Quand on n'a que l'amour" - 2. "Qu'avons-nous fait, bonnes gens?" - 3. "Les pieds dans le ruisseau" - 5. "La bourrée du célibataire" - 7. "Saint-Pierre" - 8. "J'en appelle"

2nd studio album by Jacques Brel originally released on Philips aka 'Jacques Brel 2'. As the debut, this consists of compositions written by Brel (except track #4 co-written with Jacques Vigouroux). And much like the debut, this hardly contains superfluous songs - and the album itself is quite remarkable. Orchestra conductors here are: André Popp on tracks #1 and #4-10, Michel Legrand on #2-3, and François Rauber is credited on track #11 (which is an alternate recording of track #1) on the 2003 remaster cd edition.

Jacques Brel "Jacques Brel et ses chansons" (1954)

Jacques Brel et ses chansons [debut]

release date: 1954

format: cd (2003 remaster)

[album rate: 3,5 / 5]

Tracks (org. album): 1. "La haine" - 2. "Grand Jacques (C'est trop facile)" - 3. "Il pleut (Les carreaux)" - 4. "Le diable (ça va)" - 5. "Il peut pleuvoir" - 6. "Il nous faut regarder" - 7. "Le fou du roi" - 8. "C'est comme ça" - 9. "Sur la place"

Studio album debut album by Jacques Brel aka 'Grand Jacques'. The tracks #1-9 represent the original vinyl lp recorded at Théâtre de L'Apollo, Feb. 15, 1954. The cd-version consists of 15 tracks, of which tracks #10-15 are bonus tracks on the 2003 remaster 'Velours Box Set', which is a part of the extensive 16-disc box set, Boîte à Bonbons. Aside Brel himself, the album also offers examples of the arrangements by André Grassis' (tracks #1-9). All compositions from the original album except two by Glen Powell are all credited Brel.

This first one out may not contain a long list of great classics but it still showcases Brel's gifts as songwriter, composer, and not least: singer.