JAZZ REVIEW : Cool Set by Cooling

San Francisco-based guitarist Joyce Cooling, Wednesday night’s headliner at the Vine St. Bar & Grill, plays much better than her album, “Cameo,” would indicate. It seemed determined to shoehorn her very individualistic playing style into the extremely homogenous mix of a group sound.

Working the Vine St. with only a trio--including Jay Wagner’s orchestral-like backing on piano and foot-pedal electronic bass and Carlos Gonsalves’ surging drums--Cooling devoted her opening set to an attractive collection of Brazilian-styled pieces. The choice of so many harmonically rich songs provided ample opportunity for her to display a warm, rhythmically propulsive solo style.

On some numbers, Cooling underscored her finger-picked guitar lines with unison vocal accompaniment somewhat reminiscent of George Benson’s work, but with a cooler, yet more emotionally intense quality. Best of all, she managed--in an era of brightly shining guitar stars--to glow with a uniquely personal creative energy of her own.

And yes, Cooling is as drop-dead gorgeous as her publicity photos would have us believe.

She can also be heard tonight at the Biltmore’s Grand Avenue Bar, Saturday evening at the Long Beach Amphitheatre and Sunday night at Bon Appetit in Westwood.