MUSIC

To one man, the hodgepodge did make perfect sense: Artistic Director Steven Blier, who discussed the works in copious program notes and verbal introductions that were sometimes longer than the songs they prefaced.

But the music outdid the explanations. Soprano Carolyn Betty, mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke and tenor Jeremy Little got both the notes and the emotions right as they skipped from Pizzetti to Respighi to Dello Joio to Castelnuovo-Tedesco.

Two Busoni songs were standouts -- Little in "Wer hat das erste Lied erdacht," which is filled with sweet Italianate sentiment, and Cooke in the intense and spooky "Zigeunerlied," to words by Goethe. Betty conquered four short Luigi Dallapiccola songs on poems by Antonio Machado, while Blier, as pianist, handled the 12-tone complexities well.

At the other musical extreme was Leoncavallo's "Neapolitan Serenade," a piece of fluff with trivial accompaniment that was sung as a trio and proved an absolute joy. Blier's tribute to Italian, half-Italian and Italian American composers sounded so good that its lack of cohesion turned out not to matter.

-- Mark J. Estren

The Funky Meters And Chuck Brown

Aconcert by the Funky Meters and Chuck Brown offers the possibility of being a history-come-alive, dance-till-you-drop affair. Alas, Friday night at Strathmore, these godfathers of syncopated beats achieved mixed results. While D.C.'s go-go patriarch, Mr. "Wind Me Up Chuck," was successful, the New Orleans openers were less so.

Playing to the diverse audience's tie-dye contingent, the Funky Meters' Art Neville and his gospel-rooted organ tones lost vibrancy on song after song, as the keyboardist and his colleagues repeated musical lines in a sprawling, overextended set that lost rhythm and melody without gaining any improvisational excitement, and turned the Meters' venerable funk catalogue into jam band cliches.

Brown's songs were also lengthy, but drummer JuJu House and conga player Maurice Hagans kept the sound rooted with their insistent go-go beat.

Brown didn't offer much in the way of new material, but was charming as he applied his raspy voice and jazzy guitar to "My Funny Valentine," "Hoochie Coochie Man" and his own "Go Go Swing."

Brown's brass section and his own distinctive call-and-response exchanges with the crowd kept the cuts lively. Mid-set he let keyboardist-vocalist Cherie Mitchell take the microphone on covers of current hits including Fergie's "London Bridge" and Mary J. Blige's "Enough Cryin'."

The seventy-something consummate entertainer finished the night with his 1970s hit "Bustin' Loose," then added a lighthearted rendition of his recent lottery commercial while the roadies cleared the stage.

-- Steve Kiviat