The Afro-Semitic Experience, Jazz Souls on Fire (www.afrosemiticexperience.net). This is a departure, even for the ever-eclectic and adventurous ASE. It’s not that the band doesn’t do covers, but they’ve tended to be of traditional melodies from various religious services.This is a more contemporary set, though no less sacred. The songs are rousing spiritual soul, funk, jazz ditties by such hallowed talents as Duke Ellington, Pharaoh Sanders (“The Creator Has a Master Plan,” suffused with the distinctive slide-guitar stylings of Stacy Phillips), Sister Rosetta Thorpe, John Coltrane, Hank Mobley. The foundations on which the band was built, klezmer and gospel, are diminished here (though not by any means gone), and there are a lot more vocals (in English, anyway) than ASE listeners are accustomed to. Thomas A. Dorsey’s “I’m Going to Live the Life I Sing About in My Song,” which has been recorded by both Mahalia Jackson and Nina Hagen, is given a brisk bluesy vibe. There are some trad spiritual tunes to round out the disk: “Fon Der Khupe,” “Avadim Hayinu” (previously recorded on the first Afro-Semitic Experience album, Once We Were Slaves, much fuller and richer and more resonant in this rendition, which spotlights the bass virtuosity of Afro-Semitic co-founder David Chevan) and a “Go Down Moses,” which has almost a marching band feel, until the jazz piano kicks in. A noteworthy stretch for this accomplished ensemble, less overtly prayerful than the band’s earlier work perhaps but with no less faithful fervor.