CABARET REVIEW : NELLIE LUTCHER: STILL A GRAND MISTRESS OF SONG

It’s been a scandalous 30 years since singer/pianist Nellie Lutcher has released a new recording--even longer since she startled the pop world with her joyously bouncy, slightly risque hits “Hurry on Down” and “Real Gone Guy.”

But if her performance at the Cinegrill on Tuesday night was any indication, the intervening decades haven’t taken an iota away from her utterly unique skills.

Not precisely a jazz performer, not a rhythm and blues singer, Lutcher is one of a group of too-often-overlooked artists--Louis Jordan, Slim Gaillard, Rosetta Tharpe and Joe Liggins are a few others--whose recordings were among the foundation stones of rock.

Remarkably, many of Lutcher’s songs continue to sound contemporary, in part due to the inseparable marriage between her quirky vocalizing and the buoyant support of her piano playing. In Tuesday night’s first set, her crisp accents and insistent flow of rhythm brought a style and flair to standards like “Mack the Knife,” “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” and “The Lady’s in Love With You” that was neither old nor young but simply alive and kicking.

Her novelty songs--always an important part of her repertoire--were well represented by the double-entendres of “There’s Another Mule in Your Stall” and “Princess Papouli Has Plenty Papayas.”

But she was at her best with the unexpectedly poignant “Heart of a Clown,” a ballad that managed to bring together an unlikely mixture of country melancholy and urban soul.

Lutcher, however, is one of those rare artists whose performances beggar virtually any description. She should be seen, and seen live, not as a surviving grand mistress, which she is, but as a performer whose work can still set the feet tapping and make the heart sing.

Lutcher continues at the Cinegrill through Saturday.