Pop Music : Eclectic Hornsby Is Eager to Please at Amphitheatre

No, Bruce Hornsby’s alternate career as part-time keyboardist for the Grateful Dead did not draw caravans of Deadheads to his concert at the Universal Amphitheatre on Friday. Too bad. Hordes of kids with tie-dyed eyes might have given the crowd some life. As it was, the pockets of Deadheads who did turn out seemed to be the only fans physically into the show.

And the pockets of Dead songs that Hornsby and his band the Range peppered their Dead-length (three hours) set with were among its spunky highlights. So were bits of Ravel, Dizzy Gillespie, Leon Russell. . . . Can you say eclectic ?

But if the tall, eager-to-please Hornsby’s wide scope is his greatest strength, it’s also his weakness. On Friday, the first of two nights at Universal, he seemed a bit unfocused, leaving eager-to-please and eclectic as the biggest impressions of the presentation, and leaving the crowd largely sedate until a closing string of hits.

Not that Hornsby didn’t give it a commendable shot: How many performers of his mainstream commercial stature would invite written requests from the crowd--and actually perform several of them? Rather than be a predictable hit machine, Hornsby wants to be free to surprise his fans with the variety of music he himself loves.

The fans seemed to lack imagination, though, mostly asking for selections already associated with Hornsby rather than off-the-wall choices that would have made this a truly unique night. And with harmonica player Jimmie Wood and banjo wizard Bela Fleck guesting, the possibilities were vast. Isn’t it more fun to see a band wing it on something a bit out of character than play songs they’ve played a thousand times? But at least Hornsby and crew did wing it some, which is more than most contemporary stars would or could do.