JAZZ REVIEW : Bowl Swings to Big Band Sound

The moon was full, and so, virtually, was the Hollywood Bowl on Wednesday, when 17,545 big band loyalists attended the ghostly ceremonies administered not by Count Basie, Tommy Dorsey or Glenn Miller, but by their live surrogates, Frank Foster, Buddy Morrow and Larry O’Brien.

The Basie band had a powerful advantage in that it is not a true ghost band. Nine of the present 19 members worked at one time under the Count’s command; the others are, so to speak, Basie’s Foster children. The opening tunes by Ernie Wilkins said it all: “Basie Power,” and “Right on, Right on.”

With Foster’s tenor sax and arrangements, other soloists such as Danny Turner on alto sax, and with Duffy Jackson in dynamic control at the drums, this ensemble revealed most of the unified strength it exerted in the Count’s own days. When it was not working up a head of steam, the flawless phrasing in a subtle work like “Li’l Darlin’ ” (and Sonny Cohn’s perennial muted trumpet statement) revealed another no less compelling aspect.

Carmen Bradford, arguably the best band singer around, brought her personal timbre and lyrical sensibility to the Bergmans’ “How Do You Keep the Music Playing.” The band closed with “Summertime,” in an upbeat groove that betokened a very hot summer.

Buddy Morrow, a trombonist who has led the Dorsey unit since the late 1970s (he played in the original band briefly in 1938), took his men through a lackluster session that failed even to bring the Sy Oliver charts to life. What used to be a Bunny Berigan trumpet solo in “Marie” is now played in harmony by the trumpet section, but the point is lost on an audience that may not know who Berigan was.

Much of Morrow’s portion was taken up by a vocalist, Walt Andrus, singing songs made famous in some instances by Frank Sinatra. Stepping into Sinatra’s shoes is not easy; let’s just say the shoes were a misfit.

The energy lacking in Morrow’s segment was immediately compensated for when the Glenn Miller orchestra took over. Larry O’Brien, a personable leader and a first rate trombonist, was 11 years old in 1944 when Miller died, and his present sidemen were unborn, yet they brought conviction to the arrangements, particularly a Bill Finegan version of “Swing Low Sweet Chariot” that had the 17 men swinging. Julia Rich and Tom Postillo handled several vocals capably.

True, when the band is celebrating old telephone exchange names like Pennsylvania 6, or revisiting train trips to Chattanooga, it’s strictly nostalgia. But when soloists like Walt Kross on tenor sax and Michael Kaupa on trumpet wind their way through some of the less trivial instrumentals, it becomes time-proof music.