Deep In A Dream: The Long Night of Chet Baker

From his emergence in the 1950s, when an uncannily beautiful young man from Oklahoma arrived on the West Coast and seemingly overnight became the prince of 'cool' jazz, until his violent, drug-related death in Amsterdam in 1988, Chet Baker lived a life that has become an American myth. Simultaneously sexy and forbidding, the so-called 'James Dean of Jazz' introduced a hint of menace into the staid fifties. In this first major biography, the truth behind Baker's tormented childhood and the story of his demise are finally revealed.

Behind Baker's icy facade lay something ominous and unspoken. This mystery captivated both sexes. However, his only true romance, apart from music, was with drugs. Gavin brilliantly recreates the life of a man whose journey from golden promise to ultimate destruction mirrored America's fall from post-war innocence, yet whose music has never lost its power to enchant and seduce us.