Not every band can truthfully claim to have Mark Sandman of Morphine and John Medeski of Medeski, Martin and Wood among its former ranks, but the little big band known as Either/Orchestra has full authority to do so.

The band will bring its unique sound – part calypso, part Ethiopian folk music, part jazz and part pop – to the Maintenance Shop on Saturday.

“We’re a jazz band for people who don’t like jazz,” says Russ Gershon, frontman and one of the group’s saxophonists.

Gershon founded the band in 1985 as a rehearsal band and as a venue to write and test new music. Before Either/Orchestra, he had played in many rock bands, and the sounds and ideas still show in his music, as the band does covers of Bob Dylan and Burt Bacharach tunes, among others.

Throughout the life of the band, the line-up has changed often. Notable members include Medeski and Sandman. After Sandman’s death in 1999, the group toured with the remaining members of Morphine under the moniker Orchestra Morphine.

The band’s touring, says Gershon, gave rise to Medeski’s ideas of forming his own jazz combo, Medeski, Martin and Wood.

“John Medeski was so versatile that he could really lead the band in any direction,” Gershon says.

Either/Orchestra in and of itself is unusual for a big band because it has such a strong tour schedule. While other bands like theirs settle for club gigs on a given night, Either/Orchestra chooses to pursue the road for its bookings.

“It makes the band stretch the music, it’s an adventure, the same music can seem very different in front of a new crowd,” Gershon says.

Either/Orchestra seems to differ from most jazz formations, however.

“We’re smaller than most big bands, but bigger than jazz combos, so we kinda combine the two,” Gershon says. “We can keep it spontaneous because we aren’t tied down.”

Through the years, the group has been able to keep that spontaneity as a key element in its music. From album to album the overlying themes seem to change like the days of the week.

“This album has more of the calypso, or Afro-Cuban, and even the Ethiopian influences on it, while the rest may have been swing or rock influenced,” Gershon says.

In the four-year span between albums, Gershon’s life, as well as the band’s life, had changed. He was a father, he lost some friends and gained others. And after all that, Either/Orchestra was still there.

After its hiatus, the band regrouped. Its sound, however, had evolved. Now the band had a stronger rhythm section, but with that came new influences.

“Our conga player is from the Dominican Republic, our drummer is from South America, so they have had huge influences on our sound,” Gershon says.

Either/Orchestra’s new album, the first one in four years, has not only a new sound but also a story behind the title, “More Beautiful Than Death.”

“Its kind of a way to say `its still good to be alive; Mark Sandman died, and I had another friend die, and so many bands seemed to be coming to an end, so its kind of a macabre way of saying it,” Gershon says.

Indeed, it is still good for Either/Orchestra to be alive.