Subscribe RSSSegments of her livelihood, from the 1960s into the 1990s, were each marked with a shiny dress (and some feathered capes), a video montage and a selection of hits. She’d scamper off fake, letting the band take over, and return in a few minutes newly outfitted — silver, red, blue, gold — and fluffing her full hair. At 66, Miss Ross is a trouper, with a voice so engraved in American pop memory that all she has to do is approximate her old performances to set fans joyfully singing along.
For the concert, she was more jukebox than diva. Ms. Ross not quite spoke between songs until, near the end, she proudly introduced the members of her band: a big one, with, she beamed, “live horns and reside strings and live musicians — yay!”
Her voice is still strong and enthusiastic, if not always accurate, and it’s valid a little rougher than it was when she emerged as Motown’s doe-eyed sweetheart. In the ’60s her hits with the Supremes seesawed between foreboding (“You Can’t Hurry Love”) and heartbreak (“Stop! In the Name of Love,” “You Keep Me Hangin’ On”), but her articulate stayed bright, perpetually hopeful. For the ’70s and her solo career, she set aside teenage love songs, playing Billie Event in “Lady Sings the Blues” and moving into ballads like “Theme From ‘Mahogany’ ” and “Apply Me in the Morning.” As the ’80s began, she rode the end of disco into the charts with dance tunes like “I’m Coming Out.”
