JAZZ REVIEW : Gerald Wilson and Company at Marla’s

When Duke Ellington was once asked why he went to vast expense to retain his orchestra on a year-round basis, he replied: “As soon as I’ve finished a new arrangement, I want to hear right now how it sounds.”

Gerald Wilson may well nourish the same desire, but because the band he presented Friday and Saturday at Marla’s Memory Lane faces today’s economic realities, he can only organize his band for occasional gigs.

Wilson is the last great black composer who led a band when the Swing Era was at its height and does so today. The 19-man ensemble he fronted at Marla’s presents the same values he has always clung to: plenty of room for the men to stretch out, a chance to depict his personalized view of works by the Ellingtons and Miles Davises, along with reminders of his ongoing love for the corrida, expressed in his own compositions named for giants of the bull ring.

Wilson the leader is an eloquent and engaging speaker who, instead of assuming ignorance on the part of his audience, will explain that his version of “Sophisticated Lady” involves polychords, contrary motion and eight-part harmony. Moreover, when he turns to the band, he doesn’t just conduct; he is a virtual self-choreographer.

His brass section was as lustrous as ever, with Oscar Brashear’s golden brilliance dominating “Carlos,” dedicated to the late matador Carlos Arruza. The saxes suffered from lapses of intonation in the lead alto chair but were otherwise together, and the five-man rhythm team was illuminated by Wilson’s astonishingly gifted 20-year-old son Anthony.

The band is scheduled to play a free matinee concert at MacArthur Park Sept. 3 as part of the first Los Angeles Jazz Festival.