Basics of Basie

Grover Mitchell knows exactly how the Count Basie Orchestra is supposed to sound: He played with the great pianist’s ace 1963-70 band, when Basie was still a major force in jazz. The trombonist also appeared with the ensemble from 1980-84, and left soon after Basie died April 26, 1984.

At that time, Mitchell, who leads the band Sunday at the Hollywood Bowl, was somewhat disappointed with the way the group was being run. In his view, the Basie organization and the temporary leaders--beginning with cornetist Thad Jones, and followed by saxophonist Frank Foster--seemed to have forgotten some essential elements.

“They had gotten away from the original sound,” said Mitchell. “They had forgotten it was the Basie band. Different philosophies were being applied: both Thad and Frank, each a great musician, had a natural tendency to put their own things in motion.”

Mitchell said that since he took the band’s helm in 1995, all this has changed. The core Basie sound is back. “I’ve reinstituted a lot of the things that we should have been playing.” Among these numbers are Ernie Wilkins’ “Kansas City Suite,” Quincy Jones’ up-tempo piece “Dum Dum” and his slinky “For Lena and Lennie,” Foster’s classic “Down for the Count” and Neil Hefti’s “A Little Tempo, Please,” a feature for trombones.

“These are things that had gotten lost in the cracks,” he said. Of course, the band still plays favorites such as “One O’Clock Jump” and “Every Day.”

As to the results of his efforts, Mitchell speaks softly yet with self-assurance. “The current version of the band is as good as I ever played in,” he said.

The band is busy, working more than 40 weeks a year. Still, it sometimes has a tough time with the press, being dubbed a nostalgia act.

“I hate that word,” Mitchell says with emphasis. “This is not a nostalgia band. I am just trying to play music.”

At the Bowl, Mitchell’s crew will take part in a tribute to Ella Fitzgerald. The group will do a set of its own, then back singers such as Joe Williams, Basie’s star vocalist in the ‘50s, and Dianne Reeves.

In the band’s featured slot, Mitchell said they will try to make the music “relate as much as possible. We’ll pretty much do tunes that Basie played with Ella, and we’ll do instrumentals of tunes she did, like ‘Strike Up the Band’ and ‘In a Mellotone,’ which she recorded with us on the album ‘Ella and Basie.’ ”

Mitchell reminisced about Fitzgerald, the wondrous singer who died last year: “As a musician, she was almost without limits,” he said. “She really knew how to swing like an instrumentalist.”

Now 67, Mitchell, a native of Whatley, Ala., who now lives in New York City, has had a career that included stints with Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton and work in the L.A. film and TV studios. He calls himself “a road rat.”

“I really get crazy when I sit around too long with nothing to do,” he said. “I have to be on the road to feel right, and with the band sounding as good as it does, I’m quite comfortable.”

* The Count Basie Orchestra, led by Grover Mitchell, will appear for “Ella: A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald,” Sunday, 7:30 p.m., at the Hollywood Bowl, 2301 N. Highland Ave., Hollywood. Tickets, $10-$100. Information: (213) 850-2000.

Nice Move: Phil Mallory used to be a fair-to-good guitar player when he was getting his musical stuff together in the ‘70s in Santa Barbara. I know because we played in a band and he used to provide solid accompaniment for my sometimes questionable sax solos.

Mallory moved to Los Angeles over a decade ago--he lives in Mar Vista--and he switched to bass. It was the right choice, as he’s become a dandy upright bassist with a profound love of swing and pop standards. You can hear his assured talents tonight, from 7 to 11 p.m., when he accompanies pianist Page Cavanaugh at Monteleone’s (19337 Ventura Blvd., Tarzana; no cover; without dinner, $9.95 food/drink minimum; (818) 996-0662.