Late spark ignites Crusaders

Thank you, Randy Crawford. If you hadn’t shown up in the middle of the Crusaders’ set Sunday night, JVC Jazz at the Hollywood Bowl might have concluded without a real breakout moment.

Sure, musical voltage crackled across the stage from time to time. How could it be otherwise in a program that also included the groups of guitarist Larry Carlton, alto saxophonist David Sanborn and bassist Stanley Clarke and the vocals of Ellis Hooks?

But it was Crawford -- with her warmly intimate voice and irresistible rhythmic energy -- singing “Rio de Janeiro Blue” and, especially, “Street Life,” who tripped the circuit breakers and brought the crowd into the aisles in long lines of spontaneous dancing.

The energy level of the Crusaders’ set, despite the inclusion of a romp through the classic funk-driven “Put It Where You Want It,” was modest at best. Part of the problem traced to the fact that the much-trumpeted announcement of the “reunion” of the Crusaders turned out to be only partly true. Although original members Joe Sample and Wilton Felder were present, drummer Stix Hooper and trombonist Wayne Henderson were not. (Henderson, in fact, has been performing with a group he calls the Jazz Crusaders, thereby reviving, with new personnel, the Crusaders’ original name.)

Sanborn sounded less high-spirited than usual, but his fine band -- especially keyboardist Ricky Peterson and percussionist Don Alias -- more than filled in the gaps. Carlton, leading his Sapphire Blue band, displayed his familiar expertise on the blues, but was almost upstaged by his horn players in the set’s only bebop number. And Clarke, as he often does, spent far too much of his time in showboating displays of his extraordinary technical virtuosity.