JAZZ REVIEWS : DIRTY DOZEN IN NEW ORLEANS MOOD

When the eight members of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band walked on the stage of Royce Hall Friday night, their message was instantly clear: This is not a group that is ever quite what it seems to be. Neither 12 in number nor completely brass in make-up (there are two saxophones), the Dozen uses traditional New Orleans street band style as the basis of a music that is a virtual Cajun ratatouille of contemporary ingredients.

The first half of the program sampled a mix that included “Professor Longhair” and “Big Chief,” a faster-than-usual romp through “Night Train,” an appropriately passionate “St. James Infirmary” and a driving “Caravan.”

On the second half of the program, the Dozen loosened things up with a string of audience-involving party-time medleys that momentarily threatened to turn Royce Hall into the funky environs of their old New Orleans home, the Glass House Bar.

Led by the crisp, well-rehearsed, but powerful horn work of trumpeters of Gregory Davis and Efrem Towns, trombonist Charles Joseph and saxophonist Kevin Harris and Roger Lewis, the Dozen shouted out their rocking theme, “My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now,” then roared into a second-lining (New Orleans dance style) medley that touched everything from Miles Davis’ “All Blue” to the “Flintstones Theme.”

Dominating every piece was the sound which is at the traditional heartbeat of the Dirty Dozen’s eclectically un traditional music--the flowing sousaphone lines of Kirk Joseph and the crisp, machine-gun precise accents of snare drummer Jenell Marshall and bass drummer Lionel Batiste.