JAZZ : Too Hip for the Room? : Branford Marsalis is the high-profile leader of the new ‘Tonight Show’ band, but some say he is shortchanging his brilliant talent

A few hours after NBC announced it had fired “Tonight Show” executive producer Helen Kushnick, jazz demigod Branford Marsalis was riffing on camera with Jay Leno about some lost luggage. On a day when the “Tonight Show’s” backstage intrigues once again threatened to overwhelm the program, Marsalis griped to Leno that “an airline that will go unnamed--USAir,” had mislaid his saxophones over the weekend. He repeated the name of the airline several times as he told the story.

“That’ll make the papers tomorrow,” Leno said with what looked like a beleaguered shrug, “and that’s just what we need.”

The exchange--from Leno’s coy I’ve-been-kinda-busy-today setup to Marsalis’ withering sarcasm--was a typically dour moment in the reconstituted “Tonight Show’s” unrelievedly rough shakedown cruise.

While controversy has dogged nearly every aspect of the show, Marsalis and his handpicked band have stayed largely above the fray. The saxophonist’s gold-plated musical credentials have generated otherwise scarce positive publicity for the show, and NBC has tapped his wisecracking charm by featuring him in star-and-sidekick promotional spots with Leno.

But contrary to expectations raised by his ballyhooed hiring, Marsalis and the band have been largely relegated to the usual talk-show chores: playing the five- or 10-second “bumpers” leading in and out of commercials and backing musical guests. Because some critics regard the 32-year-old saxophonist--eldest of the celebrated Marsalis siblings that include trumpeter Wynton--as the best jazz tenor sax player of his generation, Marsalis’ “Tonight Show” engagement has raised concerns about everything from racial stereotypes to the foisting upon a young player the mantle of a jazz missionary. There’s also the matter of whether Marsalis is squandering his talent.

“At the very least, this is downtime for him,” says jazz pianist Keith Jarrett, who in August aimed a thinly disguised jab at Marsalis in an essay published by the New York Times bemoaning the commercialization of music. “John Coltrane,” Jarrett wrote, invoking the storied saxophonist to whom Marsalis has been compared, “could not have led a television band.”

“He’s right,” Marsalis says. “I never said I was John Coltrane. I’ll accept Keith has his opinions, (but) at the end of the day one’s history speaks for itself.” As for Jarrett’s “downtime” charge, Marsalis adds: “I’d agree if (the “Tonight Show”) was the only thing I’m doing. But I have a rigid schedule: hours of practice, playing gigs on the side after the show.”

Jarrett’s high-road view is tainted somewhat by the fact that he has never actually seen Marsalis perform on “Tonight.” (“I refuse to watch,” says the pianist, who played with Miles Davis on the Johnny Carson-era show. “I know what it means to be in that format.”) But others inside and outside the jazz community express reservations.

“You don’t need Toscanini to conduct the pit band for a talk show,” says syndicated television columnist Tom Shales. “I think the music is esoterically outstanding jazz, but it’s almost funereal at times. They’re going for musical purity and they ought to go for show biz. To me, it is an experiment that has failed.”

“Esoteric?” Marsalis says. “I don’t think we’ve played anything esoteric,” unless, he quips, that includes “playing anything past 4/4 time.” Television bands, he says, “have been like wedding bands. They play songs everybody knows. Every day, we up the expectations.”

Marsalis concedes that this approach may not be registering with a majority of the “Tonight Show’s” audience. “There’s a reticence on the part of the average person to accept things that are different from what they listen to--it’s almost musical xenophobia. It’s human nature to be that way. I’ve never approached it as putting it down.”

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In the four months since the new order’s premiere, Marsalis has made good on his promise to “provide the best music possible,” with an accomplished house band that includes his longtime sidemen, bassist Bob Hurst and drummer Jeff Watts.

Under Marsalis’ watch, such jazz luminaries as Roy Hargrove and Shirley Horn have graced the show. There was an appearance by the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, whose star trumpet player--one Wynton Marsalis--somewhat archly ribbed the sartorial style of Branford from Leno’s couch. (Wynton, a staunch jazz purist who publicly took his brother to task for playing with pop stars such as Sting, pointedly did not sit in with Branford’s band during the show, even though the brothers performed together in Wynton’s quintet in the ‘80s.)

Despite his musical pedigree, and the fact that visiting jazz dignitaries regularly sit in with the band, Branford Marsalis says he never intended to use the “Tonight Show” to “deluge people with jazz.”

“I was not under the naive assumption that I would play jazz tunes” and convert viewers en masse, he says. And, he points out, the band explores a variety of genres: from Thelonious Monk to R&B; to Scott Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag.”

Nevertheless, some jazz cognoscenti view Marsalis’ “Tonight Show” gig as an unprecedented chance to indoctrinate a huge audience that is assumed to not know Coltrane from Night Train. Though not as steeped in jazz tradition as Wynton--in addition to Sting, Marsalis has soloed with bands ranging from the Grateful Dead to Public Enemy--he is nevertheless viewed by purists as a virtual missionary, carrying the jazz grail to the unanointed.

“There’s an underlying predisposition among jazz people that says, ‘Our agenda is to promote, to push, to advocate jazz at all expense,’ ” says Jeff Levenson, jazz columnist for Billboard.

Indeed, David Baker, the co-conductor of the Smithsonian Jazz Repertory Orchestra, sees the Marsalis stint “as a marvelous opportunity for jazz. We’re put in a position most of the time of preaching to the converted. But, boy, think about all those people who are encountering jazz, real jazz (through the “Tonight Show”). This is the kind of thing you can’t buy on Madison Avenue.”

But some doubt whether Marsalis’ ambitions can transcend the show’s inherent limitations.

“The dictates of TV are going to make Branford’s contribution minimal,” Levenson says. “He’ll get his intros and outros, and essentially highlight the guests musically. And in that context, I don’t know any musician who can shine.”

Says Rob Gibson, director of Lincoln Center’s jazz department: “Pop is more a function of that program than the fine art that is jazz. Branford’s a great player--hey, man, he might have gone in with high hopes, but those were quickly eliminated. How much can you do in 15 seconds?”

And Jarrett: “If you’re playing music you don’t have time to be on the ‘Tonight Show’ band, because it takes your whole life to investigate your music. You can’t do that in front of the nation in your little four-minute bits.”

Kevin Eubanks, guitarist in the “Tonight Show” band, acknowledges that the program isn’t like playing the Village Vanguard. Nevertheless, he says, “I don’t think Branford’s playing any worse on the ‘Tonight Show’ than when he played at Carnegie Hall. Give a guy a little benefit of the doubt that he might have an idea of what he’s doing.”

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Further complicating matters is what some consider Marsalis and Leno’s failure to mesh once the music stops. Long a staple of talk-show dramaturgy, these host-bandleader chats haven’t been a strong suit for the pair. “Painfully forced repartee,” Shales characterizes their banter.

“I think the producers were hoping for better interactive chemistry, to see the relationship flower,” Levenson says. “It hasn’t happened, because it’s not there. Both Jay and Branford are limited in their capacity to develop that kind of amiable TV chitchat. There have been a number of awkward moments where dialogue opportunities never took flight.”

NBC chalks it up to growing pains. “What people forget is that we’re only 18 weeks into this thing,” says Rick Ludwin, the network’s senior vice president of late-night programming. The Leno-Marsalis on-air relationship, he says, is still evolving. “It would be tremendously phony if we pushed it too hard. It has to set its own speed.”

Leno himself, in remarks made at a television trade association lunch earlier this month, said: “I’m just getting to the point now where Branford and I . . . can play a little bit. I tell Branford, ‘Jump in anytime you want to say something.’ He says, ‘I don’t want to jump in. I feel funny.’ Well, in the last couple of weeks when we’ve had a few guests on, Branford has jumped in. And it’s great.”

Says Marsalis: “I’m just getting to know Jay. I can’t forge a friendship in 18 weeks. Believe me, we could script something. I have a lot of charisma. It would seem charming--wooden, but in an acceptable way.”

Shales, meanwhile, speculates that NBC may have paired Marsalis with Leno in promotions to woo a black audience that was presumably watching Arsenio Hall or, now, Whoopi Goldberg.

“By pushing Branford, with Arsenio as competition, it’s almost like, ‘Look, we got a black guy too,’ ” he says. “If that’s the motivation, then that’s kind of tacky. It almost makes him look like some sort of pawn. I don’t want to impart motives, (but) you didn’t see Johnny posing with Doc, or with Ed.”

NBC’s Ludwin acknowledges that Marsalis’ race was a factor in placing him in the promotions. “There was a conscious decision to send a signal that the ‘Tonight Show’ welcomes black viewers and musicians,” he says. “The intended message was: Everyone is welcome at this party.”

The hand-wringing over Marsalis-as-talk-show-maestro raises a second racial issue. Though it can be argued that, because of Marsalis’ place in the jazz pantheon, his move to the “Tonight Show” virtually demanded extraordinary attention, the motives of other television bandleaders haven’t elicited such close scrutiny. (There did not seem to be excessive Angst over former Police guitarist Andy Summers’ brief engagement as the bandleader of Dennis Miller’s since-canceled late-night show.) But because Marsalis is black, argues Stanley Crouch, a prominent black social critic and confidant of both Wynton and Branford, he is held to a higher standard.

“The individual black person is supposed to suddenly be the version of a racial savior that members of other groups are not asked to be,” Crouch says. “I’ve never heard of people asking Sylvester Stallone to be any Italian role model. Could you imagine Eastern Europeans protesting that Schwarzenegger has reduced their group to muscle-bound machines?”

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Such racial vagaries, says Marsalis, are “not my problem. I do my job. I’ll stand by my musicianship. My blackness has a lot to do with the outcome of my music.” But, he adds, referring to his “Tonight Show” spot, “I don’t have to live through the pressure that Jackie Robinson lived through,” something he says came home to him when older African-Americans greeted his appointment as a sort of triumph. Still, he says, “If I mess up the job, it can only do us harm.”

“Where is it written that Branford is to follow any path, maintain any tradition?” Levenson asks. “I think he’s a free-spirited person who has complicated guidelines for his life. Those ideological chains, sustaining the lifeblood of the music, I think those are far too constricting for a person like Branford.”

In any event, Marsalis says he is happy on the show--and NBC, in the person of Ludwin, says it is happy about him. “There’s no question about it,” the executive says. “Jay feels very strongly about Branford. He was Jay’s first choice, and he feels very comfortable about the commitment. We agree 100%.”

Marsalis says that in the future he and the band will play more extended segments: “The people at NBC said, ‘You should be featured more.’ In time, we will. I have a very firm grasp of what we want to do. We’re in the process of acquiring massive amount of arrangements.” Ludwin says network research polls have indicated that viewers feel Marsalis is “a team player, credible as a musician; the vast majority of respondents were comfortable with the music.”

Whether the new “Tonight Show” can retrench successfully after months of miscues remains to be seen. In the meantime, Marsalis seems content to be off the road and leading “the house band,” as he puts it.

Jarrett, for one, remains skeptical. “It’s theoretically possible Branford is doing the very best he could be doing for himself right now. But it’s still not about music. It’s about letting people take you in the wrong direction.”

For his part, Marsalis’ direction is straightforward. “In the history of TV, musically what you have is schlock,” he says. “The only thing I wanted to do was present anything other than schlock.”