Harry Connick Jr.

By PHIL GALLO

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Harry Connick Jr. (Wiltern Theatre, Los Angeles; 2,100 seats; $ 32.50 top) Presented by Hewitt/Silva Presents. Band: Connick, Johnathan DuBose, Tony Hall, Raymond Weber, Lucien Barbarin, Mark Mullins, Dave Schumacher, Ned Goold, Dan Miller. Reviewed Nov. 19, 1996. As Harry Connick Jr. continues his foray as a musical jack-of-all-trades, his mastery of New Orleans funk continues to be the one saving grace in his otherwise bland gumbo. His appropriately titled Funk Band is skilled and able; their 12-minute introductory instrumental a unique blend of '60s soul-jazz and spunky New Orleans rhythms set a high-water mark for the evening that was matched only when Connick and troops marched through Professor Longhair's Bayou standard "Big Chief." Before he was even 21, Connick was seen as the link from New Orleans legends such as Longhair and James Booker to Thelonious Monk; a few singing lessons later, he was inheritor of the Sinatra/Darin crown. In both guises, Connick was a stellar showman and entertainer with a storytelling proficiency that few musical talents possess. In this more upbeat context, he utilizes his commanding stage presence his movie success is truly no fluke which has helped keep his shows lively. However, his recordings, such as this summer's "Star Turtle," have turned leaden and uninvolving. The problem rests in the voice and, on occasion, song structure and lyrics. The best at this Southern funk game O.V. Wright, Wilson Pickett, R. Kelly, any Neville you choose possess a worldliness and a weariness that strike the soul. A mere 20 minutes into the show and Connick was singing with the dull inflection of Billy Joel or Kenny Loggins; when he performed an unrecorded modified rumba about voodoo, everything blended except the voice. Worse, particularly on the oddly disjointed "Just Like Me," Connick's voice neither followed nor contrasted the musical textures tightly woven behind him. Dressed in tight white T-shirt and black jeans, Connick was showered by catcalls and female shrieks, suggesting his appeal does indeed rest in more than music. He did, however, show his pianistic prowess on a solo tour-de-force that started on "Sweet Georgia Brown" and blasted through a boatload of boogie-woogie and ragtime. He turned to the drums for Sly Stone's "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)" and trumpet for a funereal "America" (and again the voice kept it from swelling the sense of nationalistic pride that Ray Charles' version did so many years ago.) Connick's other covers, Dobie Gray's "Drift Away" and Burt Bacharach and Hal David's "This Guy's in Love With You," which he has recorded for Fox's "One Fine Day," were generally undistinguished. Phil Gallo