Deep in a Dream:
A story only too common to jazz and other popular forms, dependency is the central theme to this book of Chet Baker’s life. The introduction truly sets the scene for what is and was a melancholic account/life. Apparently 35 people attended Chet’s funeral in ‘88, none of whom were surprised about the news. A cold, dark life is followed, from birth in the house of a full time alcoholic and part time worker father, and consequently a dysfunctional household, to childhood beatings by the very same, to heroine meetings with a contributor (of the biography) in the seventies. And so it seems his life has turned full circle before the book goes very far. The trumpet features less than the melancholy, but the two are one and the same. Baker, it seems, was the epitome of jazz sadness, but his career peeped through that sadness, sometimes shining, sometimes a brief glimmer. The book is one of four or five written about the man, and that in itself is a legacy.
