Cory Wong, Dave Koz mix funk and smooth-jazz with fun and flair at Crooners

Cory Wong understood the moment when he called Dave Koz to the stage on Sunday night.

"It's like Shaggy and Sting," Wong said at the MainStage Tent at Crooners in Fridley. "Why are they doing stuff together?"

The Twin Cities funk-rock guitarist, 35, and Los Angeles smooth-jazz sax star Koz, 57, seem like an unlikely pairing. But they fit together like Anthony Davis and LeBron James teaming on the basketball court – a mixture of finesse, funk and unstoppable passion.

Koz became the first out-of-town star to perform in the Twin Cities since the pandemic started in March. And it was actually his first gig anywhere in 2020. He came here to record with Wong as producer this week at Creation Audio in south Minneapolis so why not perform a couple of outdoor shows.

It all started when Wong, who plays with the cult-loved rock group Vulpeck and subs in the house band on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert," wanted to play on Koz's smooth-jazz cruise. So the guitarist posted a video on YouTube of his band covering a Koz song.

Koz eventually saw the video and invited Wong on the cruise. Then they hooked up again last summer when Koz brought his annual all-star smooth-jazz tour to the Minnesota Zoo. The two wrote some songs together, and Wong insisted that he produce the recording of them.

Enough with the backstory. Let's get to the music on Sunday.

Wong kicked off with "Winslow," a 9-minute funk workout with lots of changes and some fast, funky guitar, a blues breakdown, a ferocious Kenni Holmen tenor sax solo and a frenetic funk finish before a sweet melodic guitar coda.

The band laid down a swinging groove on "St. Paul" and found full-tilt funk with horn accents on "Ketosis." Wong got mellow on "Meditation" and then unleashed the syncopated "Cosmic Sins."

It was time for true confessions from Wong. He grew up in Fridley, graduated from Fridley High School and worked his first job across the Crooners parking lot at Petters Warehouse. He recalled the owner, the now-disgraced Ponzi Scheme businessman Tom Petters, stopping by during the holidays. "Hey kid, here's 50 bucks. Don't say anything bad about me."

With that childhood memory behind him, Wong and his ensemble swung into "The Optimist," a medium-tempo minor-key number during which Koz entered through the audience blowing his horn. In the deep, resounding voice of a TV announcer, Wong announced the guest as the sultan of smooth, the Sammy Sosa of syncopation and other endearing appellations.

Wong felt compelled to tell his version of how he met Koz before the pair – complete with choreographed unison steps -- tore into "Together Again," Koz's happy, uplifting anthem that Wong said you've heard in every elevator and dentist office in the last 25 years, not to mention on SiriusXM's Watercolors channel.

Holmen's buoyant sax put the celebration into "Family Reunion," one of the few Wong-Koz compositions with a title. One new number had a kind of breezy mainstream soulfulness; listening to it on the shores of Moore Lake suggested "Breezy Lake" as a possible title. A sly, slinky funk tune was begging to be christened "Tater Tot Hotdish" after Koz thanked a fan for making that Minnesota delicacy for him.

With the Hornheads taking a break, Koz and Wong vibed on "Friends at Sea," a 2018 Wong recording on which the saxophonist played. That pairing and Sunday's camaraderie demonstrated what a strong connection these two seemingly disparate musicians have.