I have the same problem , but I can’t use, wp_list_pages…so .current_page_item,.current_page_parent and .current_page_ancestor classes can’t be auto-generated by wordpress.
I’m hard coding my navigation and would like wordpress to add a hook (class or id) for both my sub-menu current page and parent main menu category. I thought is_tree might work, but kept getting errors.. can you offer me a solution? Or step me through the proper implementation of is_tree.