The Other Side of Andre Previn

Once a jazzman, always a jazzman.

That was the conclusion to be drawn from the sold-out concert at Copley Symphony Hall on Saturday, when Andre Previn, who has spent almost all of the past quarter-century far-removed from the worlds that brought him fame, presented his only West Coast jazz concert of the year--a benefit for the La Jolla Chamber Music Society.

This was Chapter 3 on the pianist’s jazz comeback trail. His first instrumental jazz album in more than two decades was so well received last year that Previn recorded a second, with Ray Brown on bass and the perennially elegant Mundell Lowe replacing Joe Pass on guitar. The third album will be a live recording of Saturday’s concert, with Lowe and Brown again on hand.

From the opening “But Not for Me,” it was clear that Previn--who was musical director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1986-89--has not lost the delicacy of his jazz touch, and is seldom bereft of that swinging element without which, as Duke Ellington informed us many decades ago, it don’t mean a thing.

The three men, all now in their 60s and products of the swing-to-bop transitional years, jelled consistently on such up-tempo cookers as “Stompin’ at the Savoy” and “Sweet Georgia Brown.”

The solo numbers in a ballad medley--”Darn That Dream,” “Here’s That Rainy Day” and “Polka Dots and Moonbeams”--were played respectively and respectfully by Lowe, Brown and Previn.

The second half brought another medley, “The Bad and the Beautiful” and “Laura,” by David Raksin, who was in the house.

A surprise entry was a pair of John Green standards, “Out of Nowhere” and “Body and Soul,” played gracefully by Tom Stevens, a trumpeter with the Los Angeles Philharmonic whom Previn had overheard playing jazz.

Whether in his occasional solo numbers or in spirited unity with his colleagues, Previn left no doubt that regardless of those long years of conducting, he and the mighty Boesendorfer were made for each other. Those sly, momentary shifts of melody into a “wrong” key are a typical Previn trait.

In fact, a mental search for influences--does he suggest traces of Oscar Peterson . . . Bill Evans . . . Herbie Hancock?--brought one to the pleasant conclusion that he simply sounds like Andre Previn.