Atlas Surveys Many Cultures in Song

The Roxy floor has seen a lot of mosh pits. But how many belly dancing pits? Sure, the scene at Tuesday’s concert by London-based singer Natacha Atlas was mild compared to many L.A. Arabic and Middle Eastern restaurants on a busy night. But this was noteworthy for the demographics, with a largely young, diverse crowd, ranging from several women in full belly dance costume to amateurs raising their arms and undulating their hips.

It’s exactly what Atlas cultivates. Belgium-born, England-raised, of Egyptian and Sephardic heritage, she musically embraces multiple cultures. As part of the London combine Transglobal Underground, Atlas dips into the melting pot of the London streets, adding “exotic” ornamentation and coloration to a variety of hip-hop and dance beats.

On her own Tuesday, as on her three solo albums, she moved the geography to Cairo, Damascus and Beirut, where the mix is reversed--Western touches routinely decorating Arabic music traditions. With an eight-man band including her fiance, Abdullah Chahadeh, on the zither-like kanoun, she showed impressive command of Arabic vocal styles both on slow, drawn-out improvised prefaces and the groove-driven showpieces in the dramatic Arabic shaabi pop style. And by reaching in several cosmopolitan directions, with French pop (“Mon Amie la Rose”) and John Barry-derived trip-hop (“One Brief Moment”), she added a distinctive signature.