Flack Sells and Sings at the Coach House

Roberta Flack has been famous for almost 20 years, yet this was the first time ever she showed her face on a T-shirt.

When Flack stopped to display her new, all-cotton wares during her early set Thursday night at the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano, it may have marked the first time ever a pop star hawked souvenirs from a stage and seemed charming instead of incredibly crass. Flack said that she had never been one to put out T-shirts, until she came across a recent concert photo of herself that she thought captured her enjoyment of music well enough to merit such exposure.

Even those who didn’t shell out the extra $20 came away with a nicely wrought keepsake of Flack’s talent. The 75-minute show hit a few dull spots in which the music became slick and innocuous and the singing generic. But most of it held interest with good material and arrangements that kept the emphasis on Flack and her strong trio of supporting singers.

The keystone songs of Flack’s career were both rendered lovingly: “Killing Me Softly With His Song” had some new backing vocal embellishments, and “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” was a fervent, still fresh-sounding finale.