What's in a noir?

Like pianist Larry Vuckovich, I'm a huge fan of film noir. So I eagerly dove into his trio's latest recording, High Wall: Real Life Film Noir (Tetrachord Music), anticipating all the dark and portentous music I've come to expect from the cinematic genre. But instead of conjuring desperate people in dire straits and what they might be capable of when backed into a corner, Vuckovich's music bursts with positivity and irrepressibly sunny grooves. Great piano jazz? To be sure. Noirish? Not really.

However, the shadowy textures of those great old movies abound in bassist Ben Wolfe's excellent debut recording as a leader, No Strangers Here (MaxJazz). With a supporting crew including saxophonist Marcus Strickland, pianist Luis Perdomo and drummer Greg Hutchinson, as well as a superb string quartet, musician-composer Wolfe alternates between gritty bop and emotionally complex chamber pieces, all of which would sound right at home in a noir flick.

Dig the anxious setup on the opening "Minnick Rule," with Wolfe's quick-stepping bass lines evoking the jacked-up heartbeat and hurried stride of our hero as he hides in doorways, hoping not to be noticed on a busy city street. Perdomo's angular chords, Strickland's troubled tenor, guest trumpeter Terrell Stafford's heated blasts and Hutchinson's inexorable, pulse-quickening sticking all contribute to the frenzied feel. The lovely title track cools the fever as the strings come into the picture, putting silken sheets under Strickland's becalmed blowing.

With drama-laden pieces such as "Blue Envy" and "Rosy and Zero," the former featuring the subdued bass clarinet of Victor Goines, the latter truly showcasing the wonderful strings (Jesse Mills and Cyrus Beroukhim on violins, Kenji Bunch on cello and Wolfram Koessel on cello), No Strangers Here plays like a ready-made noir soundtrack, from its pyschologically involving mood pieces to the song titles themselves. As both a composer and musician, Wolfe is exceptional, and guests such as Branford Marsalis and Jeff "Tain" Watts attest to the high regard in which he's held.

A Yugoslavian immigrant who's lived in San Francisco since his teen years, Vuckovich was inspired by the films he loved as a kid. In fact, High Wall, the title track to his muscular new recording, was taken from Bronslaw Kaper's soundtrack to the 1947 movie of the same name about a man who may or may not have killed his wife (a brain injury provides convenient blackouts), and is the most noirlike piece here. Yet Vuckovich — or at least his music — doesn't revel in the cynical view of human nature that generally provides the dark heart of noir storytelling.

Make no mistake, this is top-flight stuff — and it does conjure the era when noir was most popular, if not the form itself — featuring rotating sidemen in different trio and quartet configurations. Hector Lugo's bongos and congas add Cubano bop flavor to the proceedings, reminiscent of Chano Pozo's work with Dizzy Gillespie — dig the smoking rendition of Diz's "Ow!" — and undergird a soul-jazz workout on Joe Sample's boogaloo classic "Put It Where You Want It." A mix of Latin rhythms with Eastern European roots propels an intriguing hybrid titled "Gyspy Roma Mambo (Dark Eyes)," and a read of Rodrigo's "Concierto de Aranjuez" starts off stately and then jumps into a 6/8 descarga.

On a quieter note, "View From Telegraph Hill," a heartfelt love letter to Vuckovich's adopted hometown that conjures the San Francisco skyline at twilight as the lights blink on, and a gorgeous solo meditation on "A Handful of Stars," are simply gorgeous.

My suggestion: Cue up either Wolfe's No Strangers Here or Vuckovich's High Wall for a straight-ahead jazz fix, and get Netflix to send you a copy of Double Indemnity or Touch of Evil to get your noir kicks.