The music of
the late NEA Jazz Master and world-lauded jazz educator David Baker is featured
on Basically Baker 2, a new recording out September 23 on Patois Records. The two-CD set showcases the renowned
Buselli-Wallarab Jazz Orchestra in Baker's own big band arrangements of his
music. Proceeds generated by sales of the recording will go to the David N.
Baker Scholarship Fund to benefit students of the Jacobs School of Music Jazz
Studies Program.
Basically
Baker 2 employs former Baker students and proteges such as trombonist Brent
Wallarab, saxophonist Tom Walsh, trumpeters Mark Buselli and Pat Harbison, and
pianist Luke Gillespie in music previously heard almost exclusively at Indiana
University concert performances. Another
IU alum, trumpeter and multi-Grammy winner Randy Brecker, provides a lovely
cameo appearance for "Kirsten's First Song," as does IU jazz faculty
guitarist Dave Stryker, whose easy, elegant swing evokes 21st-century echoes of
Baker's good friend Wes Montgomery.
Saxophonist Rich Perry of Maria Schneider's award-winning orchestra
checks in for solos as well playing on the lyrical "Soft Summer
Rain," "Sweet Georgia Peach" (Baker's abstract take on
"Sweet Georgia Brown"), and "Shima 13." Trombonist and Patois Records label founder
Wayne Wallace also steps up with a bold contribution to one of Baker's most
significant compositions, "Honesty."
The
Buselli-Wallarab Jazz Orchestra, with Baker's blessing, first ventured into the
realm of his large ensemble compositions with 2007's Basically Baker. That recording landed on DownBeat's top-100
list of jazz CDs for the 21st century, and is now being reissued by Patois
Records in conjunction with Basically Baker 2.
The idea of
Basically Baker 2 had been in the works for some time, but the project gained
poignance and momentum after Baker passed away this March at the age of 84.
"David and Lida approached me in 2005 to record the first volume, which
was a great experience for everyone involved," says Wallarab. "Since then, we talked a number of times
about doing a second volume and especially in recent years, he mentioned it
frequently. It was important to David that his music 'live on' as he would say
and not languish away in the library at the music school. This project was a
way we could all channel our grief into something productive that honored
David's wishes to care for his music after he was gone."
The passion
and skill of Baker's musical progeny was matched by their dedication and desire
to be a part of Basically Baker 2.
"I was amazed by the overwhelming commitment and enthusiasm of
everyone I asked," says Wallarab.
"Many musicians cancelled or rescheduled other commitments already
on the books to participate."
Basically
Baker 2 extends the far-reaching impact of Baker's life and accomplishments.
When he was born David Nathaniel Baker in Indianapolis, Indiana on December 21,
1931, the United States was a racially segregated country, either by law or
socially enforced custom, and jazz was a young and controversial form of
music. By the time of his departure on
March 26, 2016, an African-American was serving as the country's president, and
jazz education programs were thriving at various institutions across the
land. Jazz and America had gone through
some changes, and Baker made a major contribution, as a jazz education pioneer,
a master trombonist and cellist, a prolific composer, a builder of cultural
bridges, and an innovator who used the past in service of the future. George Russell, the jazz composer and
theorist who helped shape David's late-1950s Indianapolis hardbop group into
one of the most progressive ensembles of the early 1960s, coined an appropriate
term for David's compositions, calling them "21st century soul
music."
During
Baker's formative years in the 1930s and 40s, he listened to the great big band
orchestras of Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Count Basie, and numerous others,
as well as gospel, blues, pop, classical, and country music. By the late 1940s the bebop revolution had
taken hold, and Baker was an enthusiastic convert, sneaking into the clubs
along Indianapolis' Indiana Avenue with his teenage friends to hear the exciting
new sounds being propagated by Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and other
musical torchbearers of the times.
Throughout
the 1950s Baker continued his studies, worked with orchestras of Fred Dale,
Stan Kenton, and Maynard Ferguson, and taught in classrooms and privately. By the end of the decade he was leading a
hard-charging big band at Indiana University, touring with Quincy Jones'
orchestra, and being praised in print by Gunther Schuller. In 1966 he took over
Indiana University's fledgling jazz studies program and spent close to 50 years
there, building the foundation of the modern jazz education movement and
codifying the lingua franca of 20th-century jazz for generations to come
through his teaching, writings, performances, and recordings.
Significantly,
much of the material on Basically Baker 2 comes from Baker's first decade at
Indiana University as head of jazz studies, stretching from the mid-1960s to
the mid-1970s. "I think he was a
little more daring as a writer then," says Brent Wallarab. In addition to
being a fascinating era for big band music, these were also the years when jazz
made its first bold advances into the academy, and in Baker the music found one
of its most effective ambassadors. The connections Baker forged in Indiana University's
world-renowned classical music program, and his own extensive work in the field
of classical composition, played a vital role in jazz's late-20th century
cultural elevation, as did his leadership of the repertory-oriented Smithsonian
Jazz Masterworks Orchestra.
Baker never
ventured too far afield from the primary colors of his musical palette, though:
blues, popular song, and bebop. It's
fitting that the sole non-Baker composition on this CD is Baker's arrangement
of Dizzy Gillespie's "Bebop," suggested by Gillespie himself, who
encouraged Baker to apply his own masterly touch to the composition's bright,
frantic, swirl-and-dash contours. There are other salutes as well, to longtime
friend Tillman Buggs ("Terrible T"), and grandchild Kirsten
("Kirsten's First Song," which ends with a celeste solo that Wallarab
says "is like a little kiss on his granddaughter's forehead before he
tucks her away for the night"). "Black Thursday" summons the
sound and spirit of Baker's Indianapolis hardbop era in memory of the friends
and loved ones who passed on that particular day of the week. "Shima 13" invokes Baker's love of
puns and wordplay in honor of his sister Shirley, and "25th and
Martindale" namechecks the Indianapolis neighborhood where Baker spent
much of his youth, attending church, working as a caddy at a nearby golf
course, and honing his skills as a musician.
"Harlem Pipes," which began as a small group piece and morphed
into a big band arrangement, is dedicated to Baker's friend and cohort, pianist
Marian McPartland.
"David's
legacy as educator, author, and classical composer is well documented through
many publications, recordings, and through thousands of his academic progeny
continuing his pedagogy in schools worldwide," says Wallarab. "As a composer for jazz big band, David
has an important and distinct voice that most of the jazz world does not yet
know. It is truly an honor to be involved in presenting his music to the global
jazz community."
Basically
Baker 2 extends its predecessor's contribution to the modern jazz canon and
furthers the mission and legacy of David Baker's life in music: to create, to
swing, and to teach. At the same time, it offers a deeper portrait of an artist
whose place in jazz history is destined to grow ever more significant with the
passing of years, and whose music is filled with nuance, humor, melodicism, and
the blues-at once earthy and sophisticated.
It is a celebration of a remarkable individual's vision of jazz,
expanding that vision's recorded element, just as Baker himself, through his
composing, performing, and educational efforts, expanded the consciousness of
jazz around the countries and cultures of the world.
The
Buselli-Wallarab Jazz Orchestra, founded by Mark Buselli and Brent Wallarab in
1994, includes many of the top jazz artists in the Midwest. The group has given over 1,000 public
performances, played every Tuesday night over a 12 year tenure at The Jazz
Kitchen, recorded seven CDs, and given hundreds of jazz education presentations
in dozens of schools.
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