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Distributed by Associated Booking Corporation. Photographer uncredited and unknown., via Wikimedia Commons
Chet Baker in 1955
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Remembering Chet Baker
Listening recently to Chet Baker play and sing
“I’ve Never Been in Love Before”
on the local public radio jazz stream in Sacramento
sends me, thrills me, saddens me, deepens me
I want to jump in
I want to be there
the trumpet solo
the wondrous sound of notes.
Watching Ethan Hawke on screen as Chet Baker
playing and singing that tune in the movie biopic
Uncanny resemblance, chilling re-creation
Moving, so moving
Sad, sad
the heroin habit.
Missing the opportunity of seeing Baker perform
at a Santa Monica club in May of 1988
I was planning to write an article on jazz in Los Angeles
But Baker was gone,
fallen from a hotel room window in Amsterdam.
Listening to Chet Baker for the first time
in the early 1970s
in a friend’s dorm room at night at
Seton Hall University in New Jersey with
my roommate.
True tutoring sessions in jazz
as we listened to our friend’s
fabulous collection of LPs
accompanied by his commentary,
an education.
Catching Chet Baker live a few years later
at a small club in West Paterson, New Jersey
Hearing him play and sing “Love for Sale”
a song I knew as a kid from listening to Bobby Darin
on his album “Darin at the Copa”
History
Music history.
Struggling through a drug life
Baker dead for decades now
but his music lives on
The music lives!
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Listen to Mark Donnelly read his poem
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Mark Donnelly is a professional writer of prose, poetry and drama. He had several short stories published in anthologies by Pure Slush Books in 2023 and 2024. Another story was published in the January 2024 issue of The Mobile Library by Aerogramme Center for Arts and Culture. His “Poem for Bill Evans” was published in Jerry Jazz Musician in 2023. Mark has an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Brooklyn College. He relocated to Davis, California from New York City in 2021.
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Listen to the 1956 recording of Chet Baker performing the Frank Loesser composition, “I’ve Never Been in Love Before,” with Russ Freeman (piano); Jimmy Bond (bass); and Peter Littman (drums). [Universal Music Group]
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Click for:
More poetry on Jerry Jazz Musician
“Bluesette,” Salvatore Difalco’s winning story in the 67th Jerry Jazz Musician Short Fiction Contest
Information about how to submit your poetry or short fiction
Subscribe to the (free) Jerry Jazz Musician quarterly newsletter
Helping to support the ongoing publication of Jerry Jazz Musician, and to keep it commercial-free (thank you!)
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Jerry Jazz Musician…human produced since 1999
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