Morrison scores with swingin’ blues, stories

The Pasadena Jazz Institute’s quest to bring the music to a widening audience takes a major step forward this month via a set of four imaginatively programmed concerts honoring Black History Month. On Saturday at McKinley Auditorium, the first event in the series featured singer Barbara Morrison and the Pasadena Jazz Orchestra in a “Celebration of the Blues.”

Although she had arrived earlier in the day on a long flight back from an Australian tour, Morrison was full of characteristic vim and vigor -- both musically and anecdotally. The blues and blues-tinged numbers -- tunes such as “Smack Dab in the Middle,” “Every Day I Have the Blues,” “Confessin’ the Blues” and “Steppin’ In, Steppin’ Out” -- displayed Morrison at her best, singing with irresistible rhythmic swing and gospel-tinged blues phrasing. Not nearly as well known as she should be, Morrison is one of the great practitioners of this musical tradition.

Morrison was a bit less convincing in her mainstream material, searching for but never quite finding the blues magic within “My One and Only Love,” “You Go to My Head” and “My Funny Valentine.”

But she more than compensated with her between-song comments, amiably running the gamut from focusing on blues great Robert Johnson to whimsical impressions of other blues artists to an interactive dialogue about love and marriage with her entranced audience.

The Pasadena Jazz Orchestra backed Morrison with a combination of powerful rhythms and lush tonal textures. In their spotlight numbers, especially Count Basie’s “The Kid From Red Bank” (featuring pianist Gerald Clayton) and “Basically Basie,” the PJO made a convincing case for itself as one of the Southland’s elite big jazz ensembles.

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Pasadena Jazz Institute

Where: McKinley Auditorium, 325 S. Oak Knoll Ave., Pasadena

When: Saturday, “A Love Supreme”; Feb. 21, “Atomic Basie”; Feb. 28, “Bird Lives”

Price: $20

Contact: (626) 938-3344