Copyright 1999 Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times October 16, 1999, Saturday, Home Edition SECTION: Calendar; Part F; Page 12; Entertainment Desk LENGTH: 319 words HEADLINE: MUSIC REVIEW; VAS' FANTASY VOCALS AND GIFTED DRUMMING BYLINE: DON HECKMAN, SPECIAL TO THE TIMES BODY: There is something about the voice of Azam Ali that taps into the collective musical unconscious. A singer and hammered dulcimer player who partners with percussionist Greg Ellis in the group Vas, Ali has a mysteriously penetrating, utterly persuasive sound. Singing in a language of her own invention, she transcends style and substance. At times, her utterances resonate with the lush sensuality of the Persian and Indian influences in her heritage; at other times, they drift into the Medieval clarity typified by the music of Hildegard von Bingen. Thursday night at the Skirball Cultural Center, Vas, augmented by cellist Cameron Stone, blended Ali's vocals and Stone's dark string sounds with Ellis' idiosyncratic array of percussion instruments. The music floated serenely above shimmering gongs and cymbals; it surged forward, propelled by Ellis' frame drumming and the clanging sounds of Ali's hammered dulcimer. Much of it had an indefinable devotional quality, making the performance an especially appropriate event in the World Festival of Sacred Music. In the second half of the program, Vas was joined by the gifted Omar Faruk Tekbilek. Playing the ney (a cane flute), the zurna (an oboe-like instrument) and the dumbek hand drum, his virtuosity was astounding. More than a virtuoso, however, Tekbilek was also warmly communicative, especially during a stirring percussion duet with Ellis. His relaxed manner, his moments of interaction with the enthusiastic full-house crowd and the bravura of his solos provided the perfect complement to the more serene qualities of the Vas ensemble. Tekbilek appears again in the festival tonight, in another pan-cultural mixed bill, with guitarist Adam del Monte, singer Jai Uttal and the Israeli septet Sheva. * The World Festival of Sacred Music continues through Sunday. Hotline: (310) 208-2784; Web site: http://www.wfsm.org/americas