JAZZ REVIEWS : UNRECOGNIZABLE NIGHT AT THE BOWL

The jazz audience is substantial. That much was made clear when 17,572 of the faithful flocked to Hollywood Bowl on Wednesday. It is also less than infinitely sophisticated or knowledgeable, a fact that Herbie Hancock and Wynton Marsalis seemed not to take into account.

Marsalis, who has become one of the most publicized musicians of the past decade, was the principal culprit. Not that he played with less-than-admirable control, even occasionally with emotion; moreover, his group had a bonus in Charlie Rouse, of Thelonious Monk fame, on tenor sax.

Rouse, 63, was responsible for some of the most rewarding moments. A fluent, inventive product of the hard bop school, he seemed totally at ease alongside these products of a younger generation.

Nothing was announced, except at the very end, by which time it meant little for Marsalis to tell us what we had been listening to 15, 30 or 45 minutes earlier. Since none of his own compositions have yet become a standard, and since the other works (by his pianist Marcus Roberts and by Monk) were unfamiliar to most, it was not surprising that he suffered a substantial number of walkouts.

Marsalis needs to play at least a couple of standards. Even the closing tune, which began with a long muted trumpet solo, was unrecognizable as “Cherokee” until, toward the end, Roberts played a few bars of the melody. Marsalis then said the tune was made famous by Charlie Parker, who in fact never made a record called “Cherokee.” It was made famous by Charlie Barnet.

This was not a night for well-informed announcements. Earlier, Hancock had opened with “Limehouse Blues” after telling us he had no idea who wrote it. (Composed by Philip Braham in 1922, it has been a jazz standard ever since.) But Hancock’s variations, and his support of Ron Carter on bass and Tony Williams on drums, turned the pop antique into a vital new work.

After asking the audience if it would rather hear “Maiden Voyage” or “Dolphin Dance,” Hancock embarked on a long, clever mix of preparation and improvisation that made almost no use of those themes. After Carter’s “Loose Change” and Williams’ “Sister Cheryl,” Hancock said: “Now, for some Irving Berlin.” If any Berlin work was played, it remained fiendishly well disguised. Perhaps Hancock thought Berlin composed Cole Porter’s “Just One of Those Things,” which the trio did play a few minutes later.

Hancock’s chops are in fine shape; it is clear that his jazz and fusion bags are not mutually exclusive. Still, when intermission came, you were somehow left wondering: Is that all there is to a Hancock set?

John McLaughlin opened the evening with a modest series of Flamenco-oriented duo performances in which his guitar interacted well with Jonas Hellborg’s double-necked bass.