For Afro-Celt Sound System, the Name Is a Departure Point

“World stew” might be a better description for the music of Afro-Celt Sound System. Tossing together African and Celtic elements, occasionally adding surging dance beats, and seasoning the mix with synth sounds and whatever exotic instruments happen to be available, the quirky, cross-cultural English band’s 1996 first album, “Sound Magic” (on Real World), helped define some of the edgy, innovative work that is beginning to bring world music into the pop mainstream. And produce some tasty sounds in the process.

But the group’s performance at the Mayan Theatre on Oct. 18, its first in Los Angeles as a full ensemble, will present a picture not apparent on the first album or the latest CD, “Release.” With a seven-piece band, a dancer and a full support group of audio and lighting technicians, Afro-Celt will make a colorful aural and visual presentation.

“We’ve been doing this in Europe for a while,” says the group’s James McNally, who plays keyboards, whistle, bodhran (or frame drum) and accordion. “But it’s only been on this tour that we’ve been able to do our full production for American audiences.”

The program will include material from both albums as well as a segment in which some of the individual musicians--N’Faly Kouyate on kora, singer Iarla O Lionaird--are showcased with fragments of traditional music from Africa and Ireland.

“People tend to emphasize the ‘Afro’ and the ‘Celt’ in our name,” says McNally. “They say, ‘Oh, well, it’s just a combination of African and Irish music.’ But the ‘Sound System’ is just as important. For us, it represents a third culture, today’s traditional music, as well--dance and club music, groove, ambient dub, drum and bass. If there’s any single definition of what we do . . . it’s that we want to marry all those things, and carry them forward into the millennium.”

* Afro-Celt Sound System, Oct. 18 at the Mayan Theatre, 1038 S. Hill St. 8 p.m. $20. (213) 746-4287.

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Global Soundtrack: Even Afro-Celt’s omnivorous taste for world music elements couldn’t begin to encompass the compelling array of recordings that are appearing with increasing frequency. Here’s a quick look at some of the more fascinating recent arrivals.

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Ruth Wieder Magan, “Songs to the Invisible God,” Sound True Music. Magan, a co-founder of Theater Company Jerusalem, has been a pioneer in the integration of Hebrew texts into stage and music. Her debut album goes further, bringing a woman’s voice to prayers and songs that have long been traditionally denied to female expression. Singing unaccompanied, she applies her rich-textured voice to a program ranging from Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur prayers to the incantations of the kabala and folk songs from medieval Spain. Her performances, from any cultural perspective, are intensely moving, a stunning combination of artistry and spirituality.

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Grupo Vocal Desandann, “Descendants,” Bembe. The vocal and percussion ensemble from eastern Cuba consists of second- and third-generation descendants of Haitian emigrants. Sung for the most part in Creole, their performances are unusual and utterly compelling hybrids. The songs--some resonating with early son qualities, some underscored with Haitian merengue, others vigorous with rustic rabodey rhythms--afford yet another view of the fertile diversity of traditional music sources in the island nation.

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Cheb Mami, “Meli, Meli,” Ark 21. On his fourth album, one of the defining voices in rai music has expanded his already eclectic style to include rap vocals from Alliance Ethnique’s K-Mel. Although the various elements--Mami’s melismatic vocals, Middle Eastern rhythms, a snappy, jazz-style horn section, drifting accordion sounds and groove-styled underpinnings--would seem to be mutually exclusive, Mami brings them together with irresistible rhythmic effectiveness. He opens for Sting at the Universal Amphitheatre on Oct. 26, 27, 29 and 30, and headlines there on Oct. 28.

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Martin Hayes & Dennis Cahill, “Live in Seattle,” Green Linnet. Hayes has one of the most ravishing violin styles in all of Celtic music. Even when he is stepping lightly through some of the traditional jigs, the vocal quality of his tone brings an incomparable feeling of warmth to everything he plays. Cahill’s gentle, supportive accompaniment adds precisely the right touch (and some stirring moments in his solo segments) for this lovely set of performances, recorded in January. Hayes and Cahill play Oct. 9 at the Campus Theatre at El Camino College.