POP MUSIC REVIEW : Erratic but Good-Spirited ‘Rejoice in L.A.’ Benefits Education

The sound of gospel music may make some cynics hide their wallets in their boots but, when it’s good, it’s hard to top.

That lesson was evident during Saturday’s erratic but good-spirited “Rejoice in Los Angeles” concert at the Forum benefiting the Inner City Foundation for Excellence in Education. It was a case of the sacred easily outshining and out-stomping the secular.

After emcee Sinbad jokingly reassured the audience that there was no reason to leave early because there wouldn’t be a collection plate passed around, the affair got off to a walloping start with more than half an hour of pure gospel.

If anyone did indeed leave at that point, they would have already seen the evening’s highlights: Even a heavy hitter like Stevie Wonder, the benefit’s headliner, was no match for the premature climax reached by the show-opening appearances of the West Angeles Church of God in Christ Choir, the Faithful Central Baptist Voices of Faith Choir and gospel singer Daryl Coley.

Later on, everyone’s favorite poster boys for the preservation of a cappella, Take 6, proved crowd favorites with a brief set of their original spirituals.

On the secular side, Motown’s precocious Boys offered nice back flips and sorry singing during their untuneful two-song appearance; the Cruzados, providing the only rock ‘n’ roll of the evening, turned in a barely passable four-song set; advertised female vocal trio Expose failed to show up at all, and Wonder, as much a welcome benefit perennial as Jackson Browne in recent years, seemed to have no plan of action for his sporadically pleasing, low-energy, show-closing performance.

At first, Wonder settled for sequencer-driven versions of a few hits, backed only by a rhythm section; then he played piano on a couple of nice, jazzy ballads; then he curiously started giving the microphone (and even his piano) away to other, unknown singers.

Suddenly, it was time for the climactic appearance of the All-Star Celebrity Choir, which first tentatively backed Wonder on “Ebony and Ivory” and then collectively mauled Bob Dylan’s defenseless “Forever Young,” the theme song of the benefit. Against a quasi-funky backing, various stars half-sang half-verses, “We Are the World”-style, and Edward James Olmos even unveiled a new verse about staying in school.