POP MUSIC REVIEW : Hurry on Down to Hear Nellie

Nellie Lutcher will be 80 next Thursday, but the veteran singer/pianist/songwriter’s performance at the Cinegrill on Tuesday might easily have taken place 40 years ago.

Lutcher has lost none of her exuberance, charm, enthusiasm and sheer, quirky musicality. Her ease on stage, her warm interaction with an audience, her buoyant sense of swing, and the joy which invests everything she sings should be part of a required observation course for anyone hoping to become a musical performer.

Opening a five-night run, Lutcher did her hits--”Hurry on Down,” “He’s a Real Gone Guy” and “Fine Brown Frame”-- as well as versions of “Cool Water” and “Heart of a Clown” that found the link between blues and country. Not really a jazz player, Lutcher nonetheless revealed an emphatic connection with the pop-jazz efforts of Fats Waller and the urban swing of Louis Jordan and Slim Gaillard.

The performance was a worthy testimony to a fine artist who is, remarkably, still at the peak of her powers. At the evening’s close, Ruth Brown joined Lutcher to read a collection of congratulatory birthday messages, including two whose rare agreement offered incontrovertible testimony to the breadth of her talent--one from President Bush, one from Bill Clinton.