Ruben Studdard channels Vandross in 'Love'

An "American Idol," a grown-up teen idol and some very cool concert recordings grab our attention in this week's new releases pile.

A RUBEN SANDWICH: While we await the greatness of Kris' and Adam's debut albums (be patient, the baking often takes six to 12 months), let us reflect kindly on the latest offerings from Season Two "American Idol" champ Ruben Studdard, "Love Is" (B+) on the Hickory label (also home to Elliot Yamin).

Produced in understated fashion by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, the set revels in a creamy, sunlit variant on quiet-storm music. Studdard often seems to be picking up where the late Luther Vandross left off, but occasionally he veers into a Ray-Charles-gone-country vein.

His lilting, seemingly effortless vocals are consistently a treat on balmy originals like "More Than Words" and the big showpiece, "We Got Love (That's Enough)," plus familiars like "The Long and Winding Road" and the meanders-down-the-country-lane "My Love Is a Rock" and "For the Good Times."

OH MANDY! Most of Mandy Moore's 8 million album sales came in her better-than-average run as a teen pop star. Of late, she's been far more visible as an actress. Still, give the woman credit for keeping on with the musical career, with indie releases that showcase her as an ambitious, craft-conscious singer/songwriter.

"Amanda Leigh" (Storefront Records, A-) finds Moore collaborating with a very good bunch of tunes and talents, starting with producer Mike Viola (Candy Butchers, L.E.O., soundtrack stints with Adam Schlesinger and Dan Bern). Viola helps Mandy salute role models while also finding her own voice.

I really dug the Todd Rundgren nods on "I Could Break Your Heart Any Day of the Week" and "Pocket Philosopher," and the Joni Mitchell-evoking, woodwind-fluttering "Song About Home," one of several Moore collaborations with Viola and Inara George (of The Bird and the Bee fame).

Best of the bunch may be the trio's "Indian Summer" and string-endowed "Nothing Everything," but it's all good.

FAMILY REUNION: As a musician and teacher (at Boston's Berklee School of Music), vibraphonist Gary Burton has given a career boost to many a deserving talent. But none's soared higher than guitarist/composer Pat Metheny, who joined Burton's group in the early 1970s at the ripe age of 19.

Metheny hung in for just three albums, then jumped into the band-leading spotlight on his own. Now "Quartet Live" (Concord, B+) finds the guys together again in concert along with original Burton quartet bassist Steve Swallow and Metheny's drummer Antonio Sanchez, to rekindle and build on that exceedingly mellow, oft-muted yet soaring tone-poem style they shared back then.

Worthy revisits include tunes written for the Burton Quartet by Keith Jarrett and Carla Bley, Swallow's juicy waltz "Hullo, Bolinas," Burton's rocking, angular "Walter L" and ear-openers from Metheny like his now famous "B & G (Midwestern Night's Dream)." This same group plays the Keswick on June 24.

MUSIC VIDEOS: Most bands and concert promoters took the holiday weekend off. But along with the above-mentioned Burton reunion set, I also got to enjoy the sights and sounds of a couple of really spectacular shows in DVD form, that are likewise soon coming to our fair town.

The three (February 2008) nights of "Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood - Live from Madison Square Garden" (Warner Bros., B+) were billed as a not-to-be-repeated occasion, though Clapton admitted in the middle that he was having such fun, they would likely do more shows - as now they are.

Friends since their teen years in London in the '60s, the guys still sound and look in good shape. (Maybe a bit of plastic surgery there, Stevie?)

There's some of less-than-spectacular twin guitar jamming at the outset, but then they really catch fire when Winwood leans heavily into the keys of his Hammond organ and Clapton acts the solo guitar god on anthems like "Presence of the Lord" and "Can't Find My Way Home" (from the pair's short-lived stint in Blind Faith), the funked-up "Tell The Truth" (from Clapton's grand Derek and the Dominos daze) and on Winwood's Traffic-stopper "Dear Mr. Fantasy."

Literally every number is stretched out, tour de force. The same show plays June 12 at the Wachovia Center.

Diana Krall's recently released bossa-nova- and ballads-themed "Quiet Nights" album struck me as almost too polished and perfect. I really got into the same set of material, though, performed "Live In Rio" (Eagle Vision, A-).

It took brass, um, nerves for Krall to do Brazilian classics like "Boy (Girl) from Ipanema" and re-tuned American standards like "Let's Face the Music and Dance" in the city of the samba's birth. And, frankly, I think even she was slightly unnerved, in a good way.

She sings and plays 'em with an air of delicacy, thoughtfulness and sultry mystery that's so right for that whole oeuvre. And the band, radiant at the core and fleshed out with horns and strings arranged by Claus Ogerman, is just "Too Marvelous For Words."

Krall and company play June 19 at the Mann Center for the Performing Arts. *