Kind Of Jazz started with Kind Of Blue. Richard Williams wrote a fine book on The Blue Moment. Mine was on a rainy Saturday morning in London, ducking into Ray’s Jazz Shop on Shaftsbury Avenue, in part to escape the drizzle, but also looking to impress my jazz-loving girlfriend. I was a big music fan, but knew nothing about jazz, and asked a member of staff to recommend a Miles Davis album. And that’s how the love affair started. In the weeks that followed I bought more Miles Davis (In A Silent Way), and started to buy records by other musicians who appeared on the album, starting with pianist Bill Evans (Waltz For Debby), then moving on to saxophonist John Coltrane (My Favorite Things).

It wasn’t long before I discovered Chet, the 1959 album by Chet Baker. Was it the presence of Bill Evans, or the fact that I discovered a 180g vinyl copy of the album? I’m something of a vinyl geek, so I suspect it was a combination of the two. Either way, the attraction was immediate, and it marked the beginning of a whole new love affair.

In many ways, Chet is something of an oddity in his long discography. His problems with addiction were starting to take their toll. He was no longer topping the DownBeat poll, he had been thrown off the prestigious ‘Birdland Stars of ’57’ tour, which featured the Count Basie Orchestra and Sarah Vaughan, and by late 1958, had checked himself into rehab. He had not recorded a noteworthy LP since the Quartet album with Russ Freeman in 1956. And in those days, two years was a long time in jazz.

After his release from hospital, he was signed by Bill Grauer, co-owner of Riverside Records. His partner, Orrin Keepnews was not impressed by the new signing. He knew Chet by reputation, and also felt that his best years were behind him. His worst fears were confirmed when Chet turned up stoned for his first recording session. Worse was to come. At the theatre with his wife one evening, he was informed at the interval that Riverside’s warehouse had been burgled. Chet had broken in, and stolen his own records to sell in order to fund his addiction.

Grauer was not a man to admit defeat. He even allowed Chet to record an album with a New Jersey nightclub singer, Johnny Pace. Keepnews wondered what his partner was doing, recording with a “cockamamie singer”, and was not surprised when the record sank without trace.

It seems that neither Grauer nor Keepnews was satisfied with that recording session, and in an attempt to salvage something from the wreckage, they persuaded Chet and flute player Herbie Mann to stay on and record an album of ballads with the label’s rising star, Bill Evans. The ballad format was deliberate, with Keepnews taking the view that this was “the pace at which the trumpeter was most likely to keep things under control”.

They invited bass player Paul Chambers, saxophonist Pepper Adams, guitarist Kenny Burrell and drummer Connie Kay to join. It’s worth noting that Bill Evans and Paul Chambers were both working with Miles Davis himself at this time, and there are hints of the ‘modal’ playing heard on Milestones, and more prominently on Kind Of Blue itself – which was only recorded three months later. The smoky playing of Pepper Adams is heard to good effect on several tracks, including How High The Moon, whilst Kenny Burrell makes telling contributions throughout.

Critics of the album have pointed to the slow, ‘junkie’ beat that pervades the session, but Mann remembered Chet as being on good form that day. To my mind, Chet is a classic late night jazz album, and one can only dream about what the trumpet player might have achieved if he had been able to work with Bill Evans on a more regular basis.

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The album was released to favourable reviews, and having hit upon a potentially winning formula, Riverside Records must have wondered if they were finally going to make a positive return on their new investment. Sadly, it was not to be. Within weeks of the album’s release, Chet was busted twice in quick succession, and sentenced to six months at Rikers Island prison. Chet’s own love affair with New York ended at this point, and he moved to Italy later that year. But courtesy of Chet, it was at least an affair to remember.