Keyboardist and accordionist Hailu Mergia, a member of Ethiopia’s acclaimed Walias Band during its ‘70s heyday, mutates the piano-trio format on Lala Belu, the expatriate’s first album of new material in about 15 years. ( Hailu Mergia and His Classical Instrument is a standout reissue.) Alongside drummer Tony Buck and bassist Mike Majkowski, with whom he has been playing since his “rediscovery,” Mergia blends accordion, synthesizer and piano sounds to create a solid grooving hybrid of pentatonic Ethiopian melodies and gutbucket jazz-funk. Ten-minute opener “Tizita” twists and turns in a manner suggesting the part-time Washington, D.C. taxi driver’s own surprising career.