Cable TV is a wonderful thing. A mysterious house with many many mansions. So many channels you cannot keep track. One week they're there next they're gone sometimes they return.
Today, I discovered Sky Arts 2 and with it some vintage footage from 1986 of Chet Baker at Ronnie's. I'd seen it many years ago and remembered being irritated then by the intrusion of Van Morrison and Elvis Costello; I felt the same today. Not that I've got anything against either - any other time they'd have been welcome - but this was Chet; an anguished Chet with barely two years left.
I couldn't escape the sadness that engulfed me as I looked at the once finely chiselled features now careworn and rough hewn. The sound was still beautiful but it was beauty with a poignant edge and the notes were notes that fought to get out. The voice, no longer suave and sophisticated but with the rasping edge of the blues singer even though he wasn't singing the blues and he, more than anyone, had a right to sing the blues.
Afterwards, I re-read Keith Armstrong's poem - Chet From A Window - and I knew he'd nailed it.
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