Starry nights

Trombonist/composer/arranger Wilson marked 30 years at Berklee with a reunion of alumni from his fabled Dues Band. Over the years the Dues Band (Wilson changed the name to the Rainbow Band in 1985 to reflect Berklee's growing international student population) has kept up with the music of the times, whether it was James Brown, the Beatles, the Mighty Sparrow, or Buddy Rich. Wilson nurtured some impressive talent in the band, and much of that was at the Berklee Performance Center concert on Saturday. The all-star big band (33 strong, with only five current students) ended the college's yearlong observance of its golden anniversary on an especially celebratory note.

Wilson has a jazz musician's soul but an entertainer's instincts. He keeps alive the spirit of the old theater circuits, and in that spirit, Saturday night featured a wide range of music. His "Basically Blues" featured a vibrant, trilling solo from pianist Cyrus Chestnut, wailing tenor from Ernie Watts, and a bluesy outing from alto-saxophonist Richie Coles. On "In the Still of the Night," Wilson's own relaxed, naturally melodic solo and warm tone were part of a three-trombone exchange with fellow faculty Hal Crook and Tony Lada, former students with their own impressive jazz credentials. Terri Lyne Carrington left the drums to sing "Lovin' Life," a funky gospel number that added religious uplift to the show.

The second set included jazz rock by bassist Abe Laboriel Sr. and drummer Abe Jr. and a Bahamian carnival song from Chris Justillien and members of the Haitian American Dance Theatre. The concert ended with "Over the Rainbow," the evening's third selection from Wilson's Wizard of Oz Suite, and the audience went home happy. To which one can only say approvingly, as Wilson himself might, "Yeah, babe."

Wednesday night's concert by the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance at New England Conservatory with guest Jackie McLean was marred by a preoccupation with technique and historical correctness that drained a lot of the "Yeah, babe" out of the music. The student sextet is very assured and technically impressive, if somewhat predictable. Alto-saxophonist Ignaz Dinne played smoothly flowing lines interrupted at the just right moment by piquant blues interjections. Trumpeter Darren Barrett displayed a warm, round tone and used the high end of his range judiciously for emotional emphasis. Pianist Helen Sung favored dense chords and a gentle touch.

Yet they lacked the passion and the capacity to surprise that make Jackie McLean, their special guest, a master. The four numbers McLean played during the Jordan Hall concert sparkled with his sudden harmonic twists, economic turns of phrase, and single notes whose sound alone can shake your bones. The Monk Institute (in residence at the NEC) has brought together seven extremely talented players (trombonist Jamal Haynes was absent) and exposed them to some of the best jazz pedagogues in the land, in the hope that the hothouse environment will produce some prizewinning flowers. After only one semester, the proof of the program's effectiveness lies in the future.

The Harvard Jazz Band may not rank with its counterparts at Berklee and NEC, but thanks to director Tom Everett and Harvard's Learning from Performers program, its concerts are always worth catching. This year was doubly special. Sixty-three-year-old New Orleans clarinettist Alvin Batiste, an overlooked bop pioneer and a lifelong explorer of new music, made a rare Boston appearance, and the band played the first of what promises to be a complete survey of Duke Ellington's suites.

After several numbers by the band, Batiste made a memorable entrance on Thad Jones's "A Child Is Born." In a sure tone that retained its fullness and luster from chalumeau to altissimo registers, his lines described long waves that broke into shorter phrases, skipping with apparent ease over dauntingly large intervals. Batiste's own music -- three selections from 1993's Late (Columbia) -- gave the band problems; and his wife, Edith, derailed the concert by declaiming her less-than-compelling poetry not once but twice, for 20 interminable minutes. It was shamefully self-promoting in the context of a student concert. The band recovered when it returned for Ellington's Far East Suite, with Batiste ending the work with another quicksilver solo on "Ad Lib on Nippon." When student musicians are exposed to the best of the past in this way, we're assured of a bright jazz future.