Wonderful openness from Acuna

Until recently, Chilean-born jazz vocalist Claudia Acuna seemed to squeeze all her many skills into a predetermined package that fit the generally accepted notion of what a jazz singer should be.

But the Spanish-speaking singer has always been more than the sort of artist who works the Great American Songbook, scats and brings a rhythmic lift to her phrasing. She can do all that, of course, but the other aspects of her talent haven’t always been fully evident.

Acuna’s appearance at the Jazz Bakery on Wednesday, however, was a revelation. Working with pianist Jason Lindner, bassist Essiet Essiet and drummer Tony Escapa, she sang with a marvelous openness not always present in her earlier, more narrowly focused efforts. Her art is founded upon a sumptuous sound, as full and lush in her top notes as it is in her warm chest tones. She used it at the full service of the music, moving easily from powerful intensity to small toned intimacies.

Most of the material traced to her just-released album, “Luna.” The Spanish-language numbers were introduced with affecting English descriptions of their meaning. And she rendered “A Time for Love” and Lindner’s “Yesterday You and I” with equally engaging musical and lyrical insight -- like everything else in her set, the product of a gifted, now fully mature vocal artist.

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Claudia Acuna

Where: The Jazz Bakery

3233 Helms Ave., L.A.

When: Tonight-Sunday,

8 and 9:30 p.m.

Price: $25

Contact: (310) 271-9039