Britt/Brown Quintet Still Fiddlin’ Around

What started out as a six-week gig at a jazz brunch has turned out to be one of the longest-running engagements in town for the Pat Britt-Wilbur Brown quintet. Sunday, the fivesome celebrates its fifth year at the Cat and Fiddle Pub and Restaurant in Hollywood.

“Actually, we started Oct. 10,” said Britt, a tall alto saxophonist with a resilient tone. “A friend, saxophonist Bo Svensson, was a chef there.” He brought Cat and Fiddle owners Kim and Paula Gardner over to the defunct North Hollywood jazz room Donte’s to hear the group, “and Kim hired us for this brunch.

“We started outside on the patio, playing from 1-4 p.m. (The band nows plays 7-11 p.m.) It was supposed to be for six weeks, and when the weather got darker and colder, Kim said, ‘Instead of quitting, why don’t you just move inside?’ ” So Britt and Brown found a home: a small side room off the Cat and Fiddle’s main bar and dining room during the winter, and the establishment’s pleasant patio in warmer climes.

To celebrate the anniversary, Britt and Brown--a house-rocking tenor saxophonist who has played with jazz greats Kenny Dorham, Lionel Hampton and the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Jazz Orchestra and R&Ber; Lloyd Price--will invite some friends in for a party. In addition to regular quintet members Pat Senatore (bass), Dwight Dickerson (piano) and Clarence Johnston (drums), Britt will enlist Svensson (baritone saxophone), Jerry Rusch (trumpet) and Dick Rinde (trombone) to enliven the proceedings. “We’ll be playing our usual stuff--blues, ballads, be-bop--but there’ll just be a bigger sound.”

One tune the band will definitely play is Miles Davis’ “All Blues,” which has become a sort of anthem for the band: It’s the tune that Kim Gardner, a rock ‘n’ roll bassist from Britain before he entered the restaurant trade, always plays on. “One day we were playing it and he sat in, and it’s become a weekly tradition,” said Britt.

Britt and Brown have known each other since the early ‘60s when Britt, an up-and-coming Bay Area hornman, met Brown, an L.A. native who spent a good portion of the ‘60s in New York City, at a session. “We just started hanging out, and when he came down to this gig I had in San Mateo, he tore the place apart,” Britt said. “We didn’t see each for about 15 years when he was in Manhattan, but when we ran into each other again here in the ‘70s, we formed a band on the spot.”

Britt sees his partner as the high point of each week’s performance. “I love playing with Wilbur, learning from him,” Britt said. “He can turn any situation, no matter how glum, into something beautiful, musically.”

LISTON BENEFIT: Earlier Sunday, the Britt-Brown quintet will join Randy Weston, Cedar Walton, Buddy Collette, Harold Land, the Cunninghams and many others in a benefit for trombonist-composer-arranger Melba Liston, the L.A. native who spent a good deal of her career in New York City.

The affair for Liston, who has played with and/or written for Dizzy Gillespie, Count Basie, Quincy Jones and the Supremes, will be held at the Proud Bird Ballroom, 11022 Aviation Blvd., at 2 p.m. Proceeds will help purchase computerized music composing and arranging equipment to aid Liston, who suffered a stroke in January and has not fully regained the use of her hands, as well as to offset her medical expenses. Minimum donation: $10. Information: (213) 462-5207.

RIM SHOT: Rollickingly pianist Dorothy Donegan, plus saxman Teddy Edwards and singer Lorez Alexandria, highlight a concert Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at Myron’s Ballroom, 1024 S. Grand Ave. Information: (213) 351-1595.