Jazz Reviews : An Experienced Austin Interprets the Greats

Classic popular songs become classics, in part, because of their ability to survive the slings and arrows of outrageous interpretations. Singer Patti Austin’s program at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on Friday night was a good example of the endurance trials such material must sometimes tolerate.

Austin is a warm-voiced performer with excellent technical skills. Her current ambitions (as reflected in “The Real Me,” her new Qwest Records album) have led her to the knotty task of re-examining the songs of, among others, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter and George Gershwin.

There were times in her Friday program when Austin succeeded admirably.

The bad news is that most of the other newly examined standards suffered desperately contemporized readings that revealed little understanding of the originals.

Left to her own devices, Austin clearly has both the vision and the aptitude to properly deal with classic material. But the overly elaborate, poorly considered production and arrangements with which she was saddled for this program imposed meaningless, external restraints upon her.