Chet Baker Sings and Plays With Bud Shank, Russ Freeman and Strings

by Chet Baker

Overview

With the growing popularity of Chet Baker's first vocal album, Chet Baker Sings, Pacific Jazz producer Richard Bock wanted to capitalize on both facets of his young star's abilities. Hence, the trumpeter turned vocalist entered the studio in 1955 with both his quartet featuring pianist Russ Freeman and an expanded sextet including bassist Red Mitchell, Bud Shank on flute, and various string players. The resulting album, Chet Baker Sings and Plays, helped set in stone the image of Baker as the jazz world's matinee idol and icon of '50s West Coast cool. His laid-back style -- a mix of '30s crooner and Miles Davis' nonet recordings -- appealed in its immediacy to a jazz public tiring of the hyper, athletic musicality of bebop. Similarly, his plaintive, warm trumpet sound was the more sensitive antidote to such brassy kings as Dizzy Gillespie and Clifford Brown. Others artists had performed many of these standards before, but as with "My Funny Valentine" on Chet Baker Sings, tracks like "Let's Get Lost," "Long Ago and Far Away," and "Just Friends" became definitively associated with Baker for the rest of his career. Chet Baker Sings and Chet Baker Sings and Plays are not only the two most important albums of Baker's career, but are classics of jazz. [The 2004 EMI reissue of Chet Baker Sings and Plays includes an EP version of "Let's Get Lost" not included on the original album.] ~ Matt Collar

Product Details

Release Date:	04/07/2023
Label:	Blue Note
UPC:	0602438370986
Rank:	25607

Tracks

1. Let's Get Lost
2. This Is Always
3. Long Ago and Far Away
4. Someone to Watch Over Me
5. Just Friends
6. I Wish I Knew
7. Daybreak
8. You Don't Know What Love Is
9. Grey December
10. I Remember You
11. Let's Get Lost

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Chet Baker   Primary Artist,Vocals,Trumpet
Carson Smith   Double Bass,Bass
Red Mitchell   Double Bass,Guest Artist,Bass
Bud Shank   Guest Artist,Flute
Russ Freeman   Guest Artist,Piano
Edgar Lustgarten   Cello
Corky Hale   Harp
Ray Kramer   Cello
Bob Neel   Drums
Kurt Reher   Cello
Eleanor Slatkin   Cello

Technical Credits

Richard Bock   Audio Production,Producer
Frank Loesser   Composer
Jerome Kern   Composer
Gene DePaul   Composer
Victor Schertzinger   Composer
Don Raye   Composer
George Gershwin   Composer
Ira Gershwin   Composer
Johnny Mandel   Arranger
John Klenner   Composer
Sam M. Lewis   Composer
Johnny Mercer   Composer
Ron McMaster   Mastering
Frank Campo   Arranger,Composer
Michael Cuscuna   Liner Notes,Reissue Producer
Ralph Rainger   Composer
Harold Adamson   Composer
Jimmy McHugh   Composer
Mack Gordon   Composer
Leo Robin   Composer
Marty Paich   Arranger
Harry Warren   Composer
William Claxton   Photography
M. Gordon   Composer
Ferde Grofe   Composer