JAZZ REVIEWS : FLORA PURIM, AIRTO

Flora Purim, the Brazilian singer, and Airto, her percussionist husband whose early musical efforts created a small industry in the recording world, have fallen out of the bright jazz spotlight they once dominated. Their attempt to recapture the glory days afforded them in the late ‘70s will have to be met with greater effort than the one they made over the weekend at Birdland West in Long Beach.

During the course of their eight-tune opening set Friday night, the once-dynamic duo, backed by a four-man band, never lit the fires of excitement they at one time generated by merely showing up.

Airto, who alternated between his wildly fascinating percussion work and his mundane drum set playing (the exact opposite is true of Mike Shapiro, who alternated with the leader), tried in vain to spark the group and the less-than-capacity house. A musical work horse whose solo tambourine outing was the set’s highlight, Airto played, sang, stomped his feet and goaded the band to little avail.

While some of the problems during the short opening set could be blamed on an imbalanced sound system, a bigger percentage of the problem was the material. Although performed with the rhythmic precision demanded by Latin music, the tunes were melodically forgettable and harmonically uninteresting. They also tended to all sound alike. Solos by guitarist Jose Neto were for the most part uninspired, and the efforts of key-boardist Tom McMorran were lost in the din.

Purim’s efforts, at times difficult to even hear, were flat and uninteresting. She sang only four tunes--each in her native Portuguese--and included in her set a slow blues that was so filled with moans, groans and whines as to render it meaningless and affected. Each of her vocal displays was so drenched in electronic echo that her pure voice will probably not surface until some time next week in the cavernous club.

Oddly enough, the best group effort came in the reggae-like closing number, “Movin’ On Up.” Sadly, the tune’s title does not speak for the state of Purim and Airto’s career.