Chet Baker
Sein Improvisationsstil im Gerry Mulligan Quartett 1952–1953
The rudiments of Chet Baker's improvisation style and their relation to his musical output are examined in five exemplary transcriptions of his soli with the early Gerry Mulligan Quartet.
Simplicity of the elements and an unpretentious way of improvising were essential tenets of Chet Baker's style. Findings of the analysis are the extensive limitation to diatonic scale material, the simplest rhythmic and melodic structures fashioned by the polyphonous harmonic line of the Mulligan Quartet, precisely formulated ordering, and austere phrasing, as well as a sturdy dynamic range. Baker's way of playing does not gain notice due to its pushy effects and virtuoso achievements. Chet Baker's style stands as direct contrast to the widely spread conception of the trumpet as a loud persistent instrument. Especially while he went beyond this conception, is his style considered ambivalent, and produces tension between structure and appearance. Chet Baker worked with the simplest elements, but he differentiated the harmonic structure and built rhythmic and motivic contrasts, he did not play like a virtuoso, and in this way brought forth the essential. This limitation to the essential is also a stylistic tenet of the pianoless Mulligan Quartet, and is a style building factor in Baker's musical development. Everything here takes to function, the polyphonous harmonic line is not a baroque decoration, but of harmonic importance. Also here, where the two wind instruments baritone saxophone and trumpet are limited to the essential, they are of a clear contrasting sound to one another, on the other hand, they work closely together in a harmonic and melodic sense. Chet Baker's style is clearly characterized by this interplay, and by the resulting tense functionality.
Although the analysis intentionally concentrates on the given material, one must take into consideration that Baker's artistic identity is, like that of many jazz musicians, also dependent on other non-musical factors. The analysis shows that Baker's music is coined through definite inner contradictions. Uncomplicated appearance stands in direct contrast to differentiated structure. Parallels to this can be found in his biography. Perhaps it is the shifting of such contrasts in his inner being, hidden behind the facade of the well behaved and shy boy, which served quite early as a starting point for Chet Baker's later life crises.