Gerald Wilson In Pittsburgh

On October 8, 2005, Jack Bishop and his production company Bishop Productions, Inc. treated Pittsburgh to one of the most incredible nights of jazz in recent years. The legendary bandleader Gerald Wilson
came to town to direct the Roger Humphries Big Band through a suite of his demanding compositions and arrangements.

This rare event took place in the newly restored Byham Theater in Downtown Pittsburgh.

The importance of Gerald's visit to the city escaped
the so-called jazz aficionados, but the hard-core jazz fans turned out in numbers. Gerald performed many
of his most favorite numbers and drove the
small crowd wild with his enthusiam.

Click here for the photo journal

Below is the press generated by the concert.

Jazz composer keeps moving forward
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
By Nate Guidry, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The jazz cognoscenti are aware of Gerald Wilson. But outside the music's inner circle, he remains a secret, almost covert composer who has penned arrangements for everyone from Jimmie Lunceford and Ella Fitzgerald to the 1962 award-winning "Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music," recorded by the late Ray Charles.

On Saturday, the 87-year-old bandleader/arranger/composer/educator will be in town directing the Roger Humphries Big Band. The concert also features trumpeter Sean Jones, who is not so quietly starting to make a name for himself. "It should be fun performing with the Roger Humphries Big Band," said Wilson from his home in Los Angeles. "Some of the toughest people in the music come from Pittsburgh. Do you know who Roy Eldridge is? He was the king of the trumpet. He took over from Louis Armstrong." Wilson grew up in Shelby, Miss., and started playing trumpet at 10. After completing the eighth grade, his mother, who was a school teacher, sent him to nearby Memphis to attend Manassas High School. After his junior year, he had an opportunity to visit Chicago, where he attended the World's Fair.

"Chicago was impressive," he recalled. "It was a place where blacks didn't have to sit in the back of the bus. It was what you'd think life should be." When he returned home, he asked his mother to
move North. "My mother said, 'I can't send you to Chicago, but I can send you to Detroit.' So she sent me to Detroit to live with a guardian. It was someone we knew from Shelby." He arrived in
Detroit in 1934 and was impressed beyond his wildest dreams. "The schools were already integrated, and blacks were prospering," he said.

Even though he was to be sent back three grades, Wilson enrolled in Cass Tech, which over the years has produced such jazz luminaries as Donald Byrd, Ron Carter and Paul Chambers. "My grades weren't what they should have been, so they sent me back to the ninth grade," said Wilson. "I was glad, because I wanted to study music, and Cass Tech was second only to Juilliard. We studied all kinds of music, harmony and orchestration."The school had such a fine reputation that it wasn't uncommon for bandleaders like Duke Ellington to stop by and scout for talent. That's how Wilson met Jimmie Lunceford."He came by school to hear our jazz band, and I told him that I had attended Manassas High School. Lunceford was former band director and football coach at Manassas."

After finishing school, Wilson was performing with Chick Carter's band in Dayton, Ohio, when he received a telegram from Lunceford requesting that he join the band. In 1939, he joined Lunceford's trumpet section, and two years later he wrote "Hi Spook" and "Yard Dog Mazurka," a song that subsequently became the model for Stan Kenton's hit, "Intermission Riff." "It was a great experience working with Lunceford," said Wilson. "I was working with the No. 2 black jazz band in the world. Duke Ellington was No. 1. Count Basie's Orchestra was something else, too. They had just arrived at the Cotton Club, and they brought the term 'swing.' Basie had great musicians like Lester Young, Papa Jo Jones and Walter Page, who was the first bass player to walk the scales. "But Lunceford was playing great music, and he was just a wonderful human being. We didn't even curse in front of him. We would play seven different shows a day at the Paramount Theater in New York, and we had seven different uniforms. People were lined around the block from Broadway to Seventh Avenue."

After spending a year in the Navy performing in a band with Clark Terry and Willie Smith, who had been the lead saxophonist in Lunceford's group, he formed his own big band and toured the country.
In 1949, he joined Dizzy Gillespie's band, providing progressive arrangements like "Out of This World" and "Couldn't Love, Couldn't Cry." In the meantime, he wrote more than 50 arrangements for Ella Fitzgerald, recorded with Dinah Washington and arranged the music to Ray Charles' "Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music." He also provided musical accompaniment for Sarah Vaughan, Julie London and Bobby Darin, and forged a relationship with Duke Ellington that lasted until his death in 1974. Wilson also wrote music for Otto Preminger's "Anatomy of a Murder" and several television programs, including "The Redd Foxx Show," serving as the show's conductor and music director.
When he isn't studying, performing and writing music, Wilson finds time to share his knowledge. For nearly 35 years, he has been teaching jazz history at various California state universities, including the past 15 years at UCLA. But his first love remains composing music.

"There are so many wonderful things happening in the music," he said. "It's a chain of evolution, and every link is important. I am always trying to move forward with the music."

Concert Review

Wilson wins fans
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Nate Guidry
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Composer Gerald Wilson may seem a secret outside of jazz music's inner circle, but Saturday night the 87-year-old bandleader/arranger/composer/educator made a legion of new fans. Directing the Roger Humphries Big Band at the Byham Theater, the feisty octogenarian moved about the stage flinging his arms, dancing and occasionally screaming into the microphone for effect. He thanked the small but enthusiastic crowd for its support and remarked about the city's historical place in jazz. Most of the evening focused on music Wilson wrote and recorded, such as "Yna Yna," a 3/4 waltz, and "Theme From Monterey," which featured a beautiful solo by alto saxophonist Tony Campbell.
Tight arrangements and great solo work by trumpeter Sean Jones and tenor saxophonist Lou Stellute repeatedly lifted fans from their seats. Miles Davis' "Milestone" was played to near perfection, but the Humphries big band had its greatest effect on Wilson's "Viva Tirado," a song that became a Top 40 hit in the early 1970s for the band El Chicano.

Concert Review

Gerald Wilson and the Roger Humphries Big Band
Tuesday October 11, 2005
Bob Karlovits - The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Gerald Wilson used the Roger Humphries Big Band on Saturday night to make it clear why he has been in the jazz business for more than 60 years.

Leading the band in a lively look at his arrangements, Wilson, 87, also proved to be a charming host for the concert at the Byham Theater, Downtown. He gave people clues about his charts, lauded soloists -- when he remembered their names, which wasn't often -- and ended some performances with a joyous scream.

"I just can't help myself," he told the small crowd with a laugh.

The concert included such Wilson classics as "Blues for Yna Yna" and his arrangement of "Milestones." The second half focused on his three-part "Diminished Triangle" suite and ended with "Viva Tirado," the Wilson tune that was a Top 40 hit for El Chicano in the late '60s.

The performance of the band with trumpeter Sean Jones, sax players Tony Campbell and Lou Stellute and pianist Tim Jenkins stood out, too. But not as much as the arrangements.