Subscribe to theLast of the Lions: Gerald Wilson
Original Airdate: September 1st, 2008
Gerald Wilson has been leading big bands and recording albums for more than 60 years now, and this week he celebrates his 90th birthday.
“Last of the Lions: Gerald Wilson” features two of his most significant outfits: a modernistic 1940s powerhouse that included up-and-coming musicians such as trumpeter Snooky Young and trombonist Melba Liston, and an all-star 1960s West Coast unit that highlighted soloists such as tenor saxophonist Harold Land and guitarist Joe Pass. Both bands exemplify the Wilson sound–layered, harmonically rich, and drawing on influences that range from Duke Ellington and 20th-century classical to Mexican music.
This week’s Night Lights program taps classic Wilson recordings such as his landmark 1945 arrangement of Dizzy Gillespie’s bebop anthem “Groovin’ High” and his early-1960s radio staple “Blues for Yna Yna,” as well as an early broadcast version of his take on Harold Arlen’s “Out of This World,” and one of his several odes to bullfighters (”Viva Tirado”).
A few years ago Mosaic Records issued a great anthology of Wilson’s 1960s big-band recordings, with insightful liner notes by longtime jazz critic Doug Ramsey. It’s now on “last chance” status, meaning there are only a few copies left; if you miss it or want just a single-CD sampler from the same period, check out the relatively recent Gerald Wilson: the Artist Selects compilation, which covers the same era and includes brief remembrances of the pieces by Wilson himself.
Jeff Sultanof runs down 12 essential Wilson recordings.
Watch Gerald Wilson’s big band performing “Perdido” in the 1960s:
Air date: September 6, 2008
Correction: In the show I say that Wilson’s 1945 arrangement of “Out of This World” was never recorded commercially. It was never recorded by the 1940s band, but his 1960s orchestra revisits the arrangement on the album Everywhere, included in the Mosaic set mentioned above. The version used on the program is a 1945 Jubilee radio broadcast.
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