Chet Baker And Wolfgang Lackerschmid

★★★

Quartet Sessions 1979

DOT TIME. CD/DL/LP

US trumpeter’s forgotten German sojourn resurfaces.

Baker was a month shy of his 50th birthday when he collaborated in the studio for the second time in the space of a year with German vibraphonist Lackerschmid. Their first encounter, recorded during early ’79 in Stuttgart for the vibraphonist’s Sandra label, yielded the duo album, Ballads

For Two, highlighting their close musical rapport. Later in the year, the pair reconvened for this quintet session featuring guitarist Larry Coryell and a former Miles Davis protégé, drummer Tony Williams. The latter wrote the set’s best cut, the swinging but meditative Mr Biko, a homage to the murdered South African antiapartheid activist Steve Biko. Throughout the LP, Baker’s horn glows with a mellow, understated beauty, and on Balzwaltz he also supplies woozy scat vocals. Though not an essential Baker recording, it’s an engaging example of his best ’70s work.