JAZZ REVIEW : New American Orchestra Pays Its Debt at Royce

What’s new?

Is the Foundation for New American Music new?

How new is the New American Orchestra, whose music it presents?

Picture this grand finale at the orchestra’s 11th-anniversary concert, Saturday evening at Royce Hall. The spotlight is not on the orchestra but on four singers, seated on high stools stage left. They sing a medley of songs written decades ago.

The singers--Jack Jones, Patti Austin, Kenny Rankin and Phil Perry--did an efficient job, whether the songs were good, bad or indifferent. A few (“Yesterday,” “Michelle”) were great. They had this in common: The performing rights belong to BMI, which paid a tidy grant to the foundation and got a 32-minute plug.

If this had been a medley of ASCAP songs it would have been no different, no less irrelevant, given the original premise of this orchestra. The aim, we were told, was the commissioning of symphonic jazz works. There is nothing remotely symphonic about “Cabaret” or “King of the Road” or “Never on Sunday.” Nor was any of the four vocalists a jazz artist.

Commercial convenience has taken precedence over artistic integrity. Four orchestrators worked on this songfest. The mountains labored, and out came Mickey Medley. It could have been any pop TV music special.

The evening lived up to its original concept here and there. One of four commissioned works, Bob Mintzer’s “Then and Now,” with the admirable Michael Brecker on tenor sax, moved from a slow start to a cooking tension-building climax. Tom Garvin, a pianist in the orchestra, had a chance to display himself in his own “Day at the River.”

Dave Grusin, playing a selection of his movie themes, offered evidence that they have a viable meaning removed from their source. “The Milagro Beanfield War,” with its Latino overtones, was melodic and charming; the excerpts from “The Fabulous Baker Boys,” with Sal Marquez playing 1960s-style Miles Davis muted trumpet and Tom Scott on tenor sax, brought life to music that was heavily subjugated in the film. All well and good, yet we look to this “New” orchestra for newer ideas and fewer payoff tributes.