Chet Baker - Chet Baker Sings: It Could Happen To You

TAS Super LP List! Special Merit: Informal

Few musicians have embodied the romantic, and ultimately tragic, jazz figure as totally as Chesney "Chet" Baker. Unschooled yet eloquent in his music, the Baker mystique has only reinforced one of the most haunting trumpet styles and ingenuous singing approaches. Chet Baker Sings: It Could Happen To You is his classic 1958 vocal album. With "I'm Old Fashioned", "My Heart Stood Still" and "Everything Happens To Me". Cut from original analog master tapes by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio.

It is a great time to be a collector of jazz vinyl with Blue Note's ongoing archive raids, the Acoustic Sounds/Verve team-up and Craft Recordings mining their extensive catalog. In the latter case, the reissue imprint has graced the world with a set of four classic recordings that trumpeter/vocalist Chet Baker made for the Riverside label in 1958 and 1959. With engineer Kevin Gray working from the original analog masters, these sessions sound lush and decadent. Baker was at the peak of his craft and a master of slow, candlelit balladry, and he surrounded himself with an unbelievable cast of players... It's only on It Could Happen To You that we get to hear his inimitable voice - a wispy high tenor that sounds like it is coming across the ocean from some faraway isle. This album is not even his best turn as a singer, but it still pierces the heart to hear him explore standards like 'Old Devil Moon' and 'It Could Happen To You.' He has the heart of a pure romantic and it comes bursting out in all its tender glory on this lovely album.