Last week, we heard a 1974 Chet Baker album that featured a prominent saxophonist (namely, Paul Desmond). I wasn't so keen on it myself, but clearly the jazz gods are rooting for that specific niche, because this week they insisted upon a mulligan—a Gerry Mulligan, in fact. Yes, less than a month after the final recording date for She Was Too Good to Me, Baker performed at Carnegie Hall alongside Mulligan, giving us this album.

I'll not bury the lede: I much prefer Carnegie Hall Concert to She Was Too Good to Me. I wouldn't describe the former as particularly flashy or revolutionary, but it is a cornucopia of fine jazz: eight tracks, most over eight minutes long and each overflowing with fantastic musicianship. Obviously the focus is on Baker and Mulligan—given the smooth, lyrical phrasing they share, it's no wonder their serendipitous partnership from the ’50s entranced both then and now.¹ I've already remarked on Baker's beautiful, pure tone elsewhere, but I'm even more partial to Mulligan: he's equally delicate in his approach, but the force of the baritone sax gives him the ability to conjure drama and tension out of thin air—which he does repeatedly and effectively on this album (e.g., in "It's Sandy At The Beach", or the final couple minutes of "K-4 Pacific"). It's not just a matter of volume: as he gets loud, he also eases up on the self-control, unleashing a throatier, primal, more insistent sound (though nowhere near what Sonny and Hawk get up to).

But to focus exclusively on our headliners would be to overlook some equally impressive performances from the ensemble. In particular, Bob James (on piano) frequently steals the show for me: he begins "For An Unfinished Woman" with a simple theme, but one that sets up the intrigue that fuels the rest of the piece; his solo in "My Funny Valentine" is heart-wrenching; and he brings just as much excitement as anyone else to "It's Sandy at the Beach". Our bassist, Ron Carter, keeps things humming throughout and takes centre stage with solos on "K-4 Pacific" and "There Will Never Be Another You".² And we haven't even gotten into John Scofield's racing guitar solos, nor the fantastic vibraphone and drum work… suffice it to say there's a fairly large group on display here (eight musicians total) and none of them disappoint.

She Was Too Good to Me was clearly a Baker album with a side of Desmond; by contrast, Mulligan is in the driver's seat this time, having composed most of the tunes. That being said, though, Baker still gets his moments: he sings on "There Will Never Be Another You" (lovely, as always), and of course they take up "My Funny Valentine," which was Baker's signature song. (In fact, it was Baker's recording with Mulligan's quartet in 1953 that was later selected for inclusion in the [American] National Recording Registry.) We first heard "My Funny Valentine" on Desmond Blue, and I once again prefer this version; just like "Autumn Leaves" from last week, the soaring formality of Desmond's take ends up detracting from the overall emotion—it should be no surprise that Baker is hard to top on home turf.

Let us conclude this week with a tripartite connection. One of my high-level takeaways from this project is that the jazz scene is smaller and more tightly-linked than I had expected; in our 42 weeks so far we've discovered connection after connection between many of the big names. In that vein, I find it very aesthetically satisfying that with this album, we have now completed the Baker–Desmond–Mulligan triangle:

Favourite track: K-4 Pacific