His drug taking influenced his professional playing career, destroyed three marriages and ultimately led to his early death in Amsterdam on May 13 1988.Īlways short of money, Chet Baker is one of the most recorded, some would say over recorded Jazz artists in history and his discography includes albums with Gerry Mulligan, Stan Getz, and Paul Desmond. The pressure of living up to this elevated status helped fuel Chet Baker’s appetite for a potent mix of hash, heroin and cocaine.
Baker was voted America’s top trumpeter by Downbeat Magazine in 1955 ahead of Dizzie Gillespie, Miles Davis and Clifford Brown and helped to establish a West Coast style dominated by white musicians. Read on for more information about the life and music of Chet Baker, the Band and our past concerts.Ĭhet Baker started playing professionally in the early 1950’s working with the baritone saxophone player and arranger/composer Gerry Mulligan and then with pianist Russ Freeman. A follow on show, If I Should Lose You, had its first outing at the Queen Charlotte Theatre in Richmond. We also have a show recreating the albums that Chet Baker recorded between 19 with the guitarists Doug Raney and Philip Catherine. We called the show Let’s Get Lost, the title of a song from the 1943 film Happy Go Lucky recorded by Chet Baker in 1955 but also the title of Bruce Weber’s biopic of Chet’s life, released posthumously in 1989. We ran the show for the first time at The Queen Charlotte Theatre in Richmond on the exact anniversary of the concert with two follow on quartet performances, the first at the Chateau in the beautiful town of Laurens in the heart of the Herault region in South West France and then at the Exchange Theatre in Twickenham (West London). We have used Chet Baker source recordings from studio sessions and concerts from 1955 onward up to Chet’s final concert in Hannover on April 28 1988, just two weeks before his death in Amsterdam. We ran the show twice at the Bulls Head in Barnes and had a great time working to get as close as we could to the sound and feel of the original recording. If you have never listened to it, this is one of Chet Baker’s best recordings from a live show with Harold Danko on piano, Hein Van De Geyn on double bass and John Engells on drums. The collective was formed in the summer of 2017 to mark the 30th anniversary of Chet Baker’s Last Night in Tokyo Concert. Read on for more information on the band.
The trio, Caroline Cooper on piano, Paul Michael on Bass and Geoff Varrall on trumpet will be joined by special guest Katrina Likhtman and will be recreating some of Chet Baker’s finest live and session recordings from the late 1970’s/early 1980’s including material from the iconic album Mr B. Following on from our last sell out event at the Bulls Head in November we are delighted to announce that our next show, ‘The Best of Chet’ will be on Thursday 24th March at the George IV in Chiswick