JAZZ REVIEW : SUNNY ROSE MURPHY AT THE CINEGRILL

Credit Rose Murphy with a sunny, ingratiating smile, coupled with the ability to love her audience and be loved in return.

Beyond that, there is little about the veteran entertainer that calls for comment, let alone analysis. Everything remains much as it was decades ago. She still has the almost total inability to complete a chorus of lyrics without a self-interruption such as “che-che-che,” a chirp, a giggle, or some other sound effect. In “Time on My Hands,” she sang nothing but the title, repeated many times, along with an occasional “tick tock” or “cuckoo” during her Cinegrill engagement at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel through June 13.

Somehow, along the way, these gimmicks have earned her a cult following, even a few hit records. That she has a distinctive personality, in a slightly weird way, is unquestionable; that it is based on musical artistry is highly debatable.

She has been compared occasionally to Fats Waller, but Waller was an incomparable pianist who, as a sideline, became a witty and self-mocking singer. Murphy is a vocal nonsense purveyor whose pianistic efforts are marked by limited harmonic knowledge and uneven time.

It was obvious that the two fine musicians with her, the bassist Red Callender and the drummer Earl Palmer, had not rehearsed. As Murphy wandered erratically from one song to another, they did their best to follow her but were clearly uncomfortable.

As if proof of the limitations of her talent were needed, Murphy called Dorothy Donegan to the stage at the end of the set. Donegan, a superlative keyboard artist, played the exquisite Billy Strayhorn composition “Lotus Blossom” and within 16 bars demolished everything that had happened during the preceding hour.