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David Sanborn Trio Plays at the Blue Note

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Soul jazz has been a nearly lifelong fascination for the saxophonist David Sanborn: a cause and a catalyst, if not always the center of his craft. Mr. Sanborn is best known for his long reign in the changeable realm of instrumental pop, and his related output as a session man. But with his two latest albums, both on Decca, he has fixated on the legacy of his first and most formative saxophone hero, Hank Crawford, who died last year.

The albums feel frank and personal, even as they reflect the same commercial instinct that has propelled Mr. Sanborn's career. The first of them, “Here and Gone," from 2008, was an explicit tribute to Mr. Crawford. The second, “Only Everything," released this year, was loosely presented as a nod to Ray Charles —but by extension, once again to Mr. Crawford, a lieutenant in Charles's band during its landmark years. Both releases, produced by Phil Ramone, feature the occasional guest vocal. (Inexplicably, Joss Stone made the cut twice.) The most pronounced difference between them is the presence, throughout “Only Everything," of the Hammond B-3 organist Joey DeFrancesco.

And so it goes at the Blue Note this week, where Mr. Sanborn is at the helm of a hard-charging trio with Mr. DeFrancesco and the drummer Byron Landham. That format, sparser than usual for him, recalls the organ-trio protocols at the heart of much great 1960s soul jazz. Less predictably, it tilts the usual bandleader-sideman hierarchy onstage. Put simply, it's often as much Mr. DeFrancesco's show, and sometimes more so.

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