Laura Nyro At Pine Knob, June 9

Laura Nyro ended a self-imposed three-year exile from the music business last fall when she recorded her new album, Smile (The Sun, Vol. 4, No. 6), and started touring again. Nyro finally played before a jubilant audience at Pine Knob June 9, marking her return to the Detroit area after an absence of several years.

The music on Nyro's new album and everything she plays on stage uses many obvious jazz elements to great effect. Along with her new stuff, she and her band have given jazz arrangements to many of her earlier songs-which were heavily influenced by black R & B in the first place-and the hungry, young, white, suburban audience ate up every bit of it.

Nyro's band is an impressive group of male and female musicians with a primary commitment to jazz and R & B. It includes guitarist John Tropea, of Deodato; bassist Richard Davis; former Sly Stone drummer Andy Newmark; and three former members of the all-woman band Isis: Liberty Mata on percussion, Jeanie Fineberg on sax and flute, and Lauren Draper on trumpet and french horn. Laura accompanies herself on piano and occasional acoustic guilar, and two men (sax and vibes), whose names we unfortunately didn't catch, complete the expanded ensemble.

Laura Nyro's voice sounds lower and deeper since we last heard her in Detroit-she seems to have more control, clearer inflection, and her presence on-stage is more self-assured, commanding more power. Old material that sounds even stronger now included "When I Die," given somewhat of a funk-jazz treatment, and "Sweet Blindness," which has Tropea strumming in the background as the only accompaniment.

Women blowing blues and jazz through all kinds of horns is not a common musical sight, and it caused intense excitement at Pine Knob especially from the women in the audience, who obviously were refreshed by the fact that members of their own sex were getting it on, and being respected, as proficient, competent musicians. An energetic, compelling Lauren Draper drew applause and shouts of recognition during her trumpet solo in "I Am The Blues," and flautist Jeanie Fineberg was heard to blow a mean saxophone, another instrument rare to women.

Let's hope that Nyro and her fine band can return to Detroit again real soon-but this time semewhere in the city, where the rest of us can get our ears on her.

-Sheri Terebelo