Eliane Elias
I THOUGHT ABOUT YOU: A TRIBUTE TO CHET BAKER—Concord Jazz 34191. Web: ConcordMusicGroup.com, elianeelias.com. I Thought About You; There Will Never Be Another You; This Can’t Be Love; Embraceable You; That Old Feeling: Everything Depends on You; I’ve Never Been in Love Before; Let’s Get Lost; You Don’t Know What Love Is; Blue Room; Just Friends; Girl Talk; Just in Time; I Get Along Without You Very Well
PERSONNEL: Eliane Elias, vocals, acoustic piano; Randy Brecker, trumpet; Oscar Castro- Neves, guitar; Marc Johnson, bass; Raphael Barata, drums; Marivaldo dos Santos, percussion
By Alex Henderson
No less than 25 years have passed since the death of cool jazz legend Chet Baker, who was 58 when he plunged to his death from a second-floor hotel room in Amsterdam in 1988. The Dutch authorities ruled that Baker’s death was an accident, noting that there was no evidence of a struggle or foul play. Baker, to be sure, lived hard and fast—and glossing over his battle with heroin and other lurid aspects of his life is intellectually dishonest. But Baker, for all his demons, could be remarkably expressive as both a trumpeter and a vocalist. For Baker, post-swing jazz was about feeling and emotion rather than chops for the sake of chops. And Brazilian pianist/vocalist Eliane Elias really brings that out on I Thought About You: A Tribute to Chet Baker.
Whether she is turning her attention to “Let’s Get Lost” (which became Baker’s theme song), “This Can’t Be Love” or Neal Hefti’s “Girl Talk,” Elias successfully zeros in on the things that made Baker so compelling: warmth, intimacy and heartfelt expression. Elias gets her points across. And she salutes Baker on her own terms, putting a Brazilian spin on 14 songs associated with the late jazzman. It doesn’t matter whether or not a particular track actually employs a Brazilian beat; Elias’ vocals convey a feeling of saudade regardless. Elias finds the connection between cool jazz and saudade, which is quite appropriate in light of the fact that some of the most important figures in Brazilian jazz were American musicians who came from the Cool School (including alto saxophonist Bud Shank and tenor saxophonist Stan Getz).
With I Thought About You, acknowledges Baker and Brazilian jazz at the same time—and the results are consistently engaging.•••
