JAZZ REVIEW : Alexandria Sticks to the Familiar

Lorez Alexandria, who opened Thursday at the Loa and closes Sunday, has enjoyed a relatively stable career as a singer who can command a receptive audience in the Southland’s jazz clubs. Essentially, though, there have been few peaks or valleys; she is performing in the same kinds of venues, and singing much the same repertoire, that became associated with her when she moved here from Chicago in the early 1960s.

Others who share her pure jazz timbre and freedom of phrasing (Ernestine Anderson comes to mind) have been a little more fortunate than she in terms of reaction to their recordings. A few years ago, Alexandria taped a long series of Johnny Mercer songs (only one of which she sang Thursday), but she has yet to come up with a single piece of material that has earned her a strong individual image.

Opening with two Duke Ellington tunes, she concentrated mainly on material from the 1930s and ‘40s, diversifying only to the extent of singing “Tangerine” and “Nature Boy” as waltzes. Though she seemed cheerfully confident at all times, there was no evidence of any attempt to emerge from what has become a comfortable rut. She is too good an artist to go on through the years singing “Satin Doll” and the other predictable standards.

Her accompaniment, too, was in keeping with the familiar nightclub mold: The conventionally capable piano-bass-drums trio of Gildo Mahones, Allan Jackson and Clarence Johnston backed her just as they have off and on for many years. One can only hope this superior performer will find a vocal platform to take her belatedly toward a new plateau of acceptance in the jazz community.