BOB BELDEN : His Not-So-Big Band Finds Less Is More

Don’t call Bob Belden’s 16-piece group a “big band.”

“Nah,” says the thirty-something saxophonist, arranger and bandleader. “That sounds too much like Harry James. I like to think of it as a ‘small orchestra.’ ”

Whatever the label, the little-known New York-based Belden and his big-small ensemble took a dramatic step toward greater visibility this fall with the release of “The Music of Sting” on Blue Note Records.

The album flies in the face of the standard wisdom that jazz versions of pop and rock tunes rarely have any impact on the wider record audience.

“Oh, there has been resistance,” he explains. “Some people say, ‘You’re just using Sting’s music to do this or that for your own career.’ But I guess they don’t remember Paul Desmond doing Simon & Garfunkel or Stan Getz doing Burt Bacharach.”

Despite generally good reviews, however, the recording has had difficulty acquiring all-important radio airplay.

“There are pop stations that don’t want to play a cover of a Sting tune, because, they say, ‘We might as well play the original,’ ” Belden says. “And I say, ‘Well, then the next time Michael Bolton releases a Ray Charles cover, tell him the same thing.’

“And on the other side, some jazz stations don’t want to play Sting music because he’s a pop act. But they won’t hesitate to play a Broadway show tune.”

A thoughtful artist who is extremely knowledgeable about historical trends--from classical to ‘90s hip-hop--Belden refuses to accept the limitations of what he describes as a “narrowcasting” attitude in the music world.

“I think that the concept of jazz as a specific, limited, evolving art form--moving from this to that--is an outdated ‘60s concept,” he says. “To me, music flows wherever it happens. It’s all up to the artist.

“I feel--as a composer--that whatever you feel like doing is what you should do. And I’ll bet even Sting wouldn’t disagree with that, no matter what he thinks of our album.”