POP MUSIC REVIEW : Accordion Puts Kick in Little Joe’s Songs

Imagine what might befall the art of Mexican cookery if some blight suddenly eradicated the world supply of hot peppers.

Nearly that much spice went out of the Tejano music of Little Joe & La Familia after a button accordion was lost or stolen Thursday during a bus ride through Texas, leaving Lalo Torres without an instrument for the opening set of the band’s show Friday at the Galaxy Theatre in Santa Ana. Despite the sturdy-voiced, indefatigable presence of Little Joe Hernandez, and sharp soloists on guitar, keyboards and saxophone, the nine-man band from Temple, Texas, at first could muster only a homogenized facsimile of its boundary-hopping stylistic blend.

The music that Little Joe, 55, has been playing for more than 30 years is grounded mainly in Mexican tradition, yet it is definitively American in its nonpurist, anything-goes willingness to sample a little of this and a little of that.

But some organic essence was missing without the accordion, an earthy attachment to traditional Mexican folk music that is vital given Little Joe’s penchant for mixing in such polished, less distinctive elements as synthesized orchestrations.

Luckily, a substitute accordion was located in time for the second set, and La Familia was whole again. Torres’ dancing accordion fills, dizzy skids and enlivening, breeze-like blasts of merriment rubbed off on the entire band, yielding a generous 85-minute second set. Where there had been strong effort and tight proficiency, but no special spirit, there was now the musical embodiment of freedom and playfulness.