JAZZ REVIEW
The multinational ensemble combines diversity with musicality in an engaging fashion.

By DON HECKMAN, Special to The Times


     Popular music in France has always had more to do with blending and combining than with isolating into specific genres. From the early days, in which the boundaries between cabaret and jazz were constantly circumvented, to the present-day potpourri of world, jazz, pop and dance music streaming out of the Paris studios, there has always been a belief in universality rather than separateness.
     The performance by Paris Combo at the Skirball Cultural Center on Thursday night was a classic example of that universality in action.
     Consider the elements of the ensemble: Belle du Berry, the singer and writer of many of the group's witty, often irony-tinged songs (whose themes are apparent in titles such as "Mais Que Fait la NASA," "Berceuse Insomniaque" and "Traits de Caractere"), performed with a blend of cabaret theatricality and smoothly rhythmic phrasing.
     David Lewis, moving from trumpet and fluegelhorn to piano, added touches of Miles Davis timbres alternating with rhapsodic keyboard work. Guitarist Potzi repeatedly affirmed his familiarity and affection for Django Reinhardt. Drummer-singer-whistler Francois-Francois mixed '30s swing style with driving bop rhythms. And bassist Mano Razanajato, reminiscent of Richard Bona, offered superb bass work, smooth balladry and a knack for scat singing with his improvised solo lines.
     A true global smorgasbord, in other words, and it is seasoned by the fact that Du Berry and Francois-Francois are French, Potzi is a Gypsy, Razanajato is from Madagascar and Lewis is Australian.
     Diverse influences alone, of course, do not necessarily make for first-rate music. Paris Combo supported its musical diversity with impressive musicality, which often surfaced in relatively subtle fashion as pieces casually performed in such offbeat meters as 7/4 and 11/8, not exactly the everyday stuff of either pop or jazz.
     In addition, the pieces were assembled with a consistently creative sense of contrast and pacing, positioning brief instrumental solos in and around Du Berry's vocals, underscoring melodies with foot-tapping ostinato rhythmic patterns and occasionally breaking out in straight-ahead jazz improvisation.
     The performance of Paris Combo, in other words, presented music with the sort of engaging appeal that bypassed any need for definition or category. This, when you get right down to it, is what all music should--and too often doesn't--have to offer.