Veteran Guitarist, Rookie Saxman Share Concert Bill : Music: Larry Carlton, newcomer Dave Koz to perform Sunday at Humphrey’s Concerts by the Bay.

In a recording career spanning 23 years, 10 solo albums and contributions to more than 100 gold albums by other artists, Larry Carlton has yet to equal the explosive debut of pop-jazz saxophonist Dave Koz.

Koz’s self-titled first album, released last year, has sold 250,000, while Carlton’s most successful efforts, including 1989’s “On Solid Ground,” peaked around 225,000.

Carlton, 43, the mercurial pop-jazz-rock-you-name-it guitarist, and Koz, 28, the pop-jazz rookie, appear Sunday night at Humphrey’s Concerts by the Bay. The two will not be playing together, however.

When talking about Koz’s comparatively rapid commercial rise, Carlton shows no envy or bitterness.

“I’m happy for Koz, but the reason my record sales aren’t as high is because I haven’t been with a label that’s been focused on instrumental music,” Carlton said. “MCA barely had a jazz department when I started with them (in 1986). My acoustic albums (‘Alone/But Never Alone’ and ‘Discovery’) were the first releases on the MCA Masters Series, and they had no idea some of those songs would become such radio hits. To put it bluntly, the (marketing) machine wasn’t in place.

“Those of us who were making (instrumental) records during the early and mid-1980s kind of paved the way. Today, companies know there are sales to be had in the instrumental marketplace.”

Carlton moved to the GRP label last year when the company was acquired by his previous label, industry giant MCA. And, although Carlton believes recording companies now know how to market instrumental music, his new album--a follow-up to last year’s “Collection”--threw GRP for a loop.

“I had already told them I didn’t know what I was going to do, but it would be different,” said Carlton, who lives on a 2.5-acre spread near Magic Mountain, north of Los Angeles, with his second wife, gospel singer Michele Pillar.

“I wrote a bunch of songs, hired some guys and the music kind of came together in the studio. After the first two days of recording, I thought, ‘I want a blues harmonica in the band, no sax.’

“I called the best blues harmonica player I ever heard, Terry McMillan from Nashville. Then I decided to use only acoustic piano and a Hammond B-3 organ in place of synthesizers, and I got Matt Rollings (from Lyle Lovett’s band).

“The material could have been arranged many ways, but we took a hard-edged, more rock ‘n’ roll approach. . . . The ultimate bottom line is GRP has decided they’re not the label for this, they’re not sure they can do justice to it.”

So Carlton is without a new release to go with his current mini-tour. Assuming he signs a new recording deal (his seven-album deal with GRP would remain intact) and a new album is released next year, Carlton plans a major tour in support.

Humphrey’s concert-goers will hear a mix of old Carlton favorites and four or five of the new songs. Carlton’s new, sax-less sound is not good news for at least one San Diegan. Saxophonist Hollis Gentry, who had become a regular in Carlton’s road band, is out of a job.

Carlton’s new band will look more like a rock-blues outfit. He’ll be backed by a straightforward lineup of drums, bass, keyboards, and harmonica.

“On the older material, like ‘Smiles and Smiles to Go’ and ‘Minute by Minute,’ Matt plays what’s appropriate, and it sounds like the record,” Carlton said. “But it will be real interesting to hear ‘Minute by Minute’ with harmonica instead of sax.”

Carlton’s career, which began with his 1968 debut solo album, “With a Little Help From My Friends,” has reeled through an incredible range of associations.

He was known as Larry Guitar on “Mrs. Alphabet,” an NBC-TV children’s show that aired during the early 1980s. He made 13 albums with the Crusaders, four more with Steely Dan during the late 1970s, and, during his peak 1970s years as a session guitarist, played on recordings by Quincy Jones, Michael Jackson, John Lennon, Dolly Parton, Bobby Bland and many others. He also wrote music for the TV show “Who’s The Boss” and the movie “Against All Odds,” and arranged Joan Baez’s “Diamonds and Rust” album.

In 1987, Carlton won a Grammy for his version of the Doobie Brothers’ “Minute by Minute,” from his live album “Last Nite.” Carlton’s other Grammy was for the theme music he wrote for the TV show “Hill Street Blues.”

Carlton, who plans to take time off this fall to go trout fishing in the San Joaquin Valley, sees his new, rock-blues direction as more than a passing fancy.

“At this point, it definitely has the possibility of being something I’ll continue to do,” he said.

Koz, on the other hand, displays no such inclination to depart from the light, warm, romantic sound that fueled his rapid rise.

“I spent a lot of time checking out the masters--Charlie Parker, Phil Woods, Sonny Stitt, Sonny Rollins, the great masters of the instrument,” Koz said of his formative years at UCLA during the early 1980s, where he majored in mass communications.

“The reason I studied them was because I think it’s important, being a contemporary saxophonist, to at least take a look at where the sax has been in the past.

“But, when it came time to play what I felt in my heart, it wasn’t that. What I have on my record is just honest, an accurate representation of me when I made the record.”

Koz, who is single and lives in Los Angeles, has played on albums by Ray Charles, Joan Armatrading Natalie Cole and even U2, but he credits singer Bobby Caldwell with launching him into the limelight. Koz played sax on Caldwell’s 1989 release “Heart of Mine” and joined Caldwell for several club dates around Los Angeles.

Los Angeles saxophonist Tom Scott has been another of Koz’s mentors. Koz finally hooked up with his hero when they played together in the house band for Pat Sajak’s short-lived late-night television show, which lasted just over a year and went off the air in 1989.

“I grew up admiring him so much, as a player and a consummate musician,” Koz said of Scott. “Regardless of whether the ‘Pat Sajak Show’ was good, I got a chance to work with my idol every night, five nights a week, and that was a dream come true for me.”

Koz comes to San Diego fresh off an early September promotional tour that took him through six countries in 14 days, with stops in Taipei, Manila, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia and Australia.

According to his publicist, Koz was marketed abroad as a pop star, and as such was mobbed by teen-age girls, to the extent that he required a bodyguard at times.

“It was really my first experience at being a celebrity,” Koz said. “It was really incredible. I picked up my first gold record in Malaysia. Even though gold there is 15,000 copies, which we’ve sold many times over in the U.S., it was a big deal.”

This is Koz’s first time at Humphrey’s, and his appearance at the 1,200-seat venue is a sign of his rocketing career. When he played San Diego last May with singer Phil Perry, they appeared at the Bacchanal.

Koz has been amazed at his success.

“My goal in putting out this record was to sell as many as it would take for them (Capitol Records) to let me make another record,” he said. “I’ve certainly reached that goal. The next goal was 100,000, which for an instrumental artist is a milestone. Everything else has been icing on the cake. I’m thrilled beyond my wildest dreams.”

Larry Carlton and Dave Koz will play shows at 6 and 8:30 this Sunday night at Humphrey’s Concerts by the Bay. Tickets are $20, and are available for both shows.