Kick Out the Jams: Little Richard at the Orleans, Jan. 8

Little Richard's breakthrough hit, "Tutti Frutti," climbed the charts 50 years ago, when the Macon, Ga., native was 22 years old. Today, at age 72, Richard is still performing, although he can no longer deliver the high-energy performances that earned him a place of honor in the annals of pop music and inspired the likes of James Brown and Prince.

As you might expect, Richard is showing his age. He walked onto the stage with an old man's slow, careful gait, and he had to be helped up onto the piano top to take a bow. There sometimes were prolonged silences between songs as Richard caught his breath. But his trademark falsetto wail and nimble piano playing retained the vitality of youth. His well-honed sense of humor also played well with the easy-to-please audience.

The Saturday night show in the Orleans showroom drew a capacity crowd of 829, mostly older folks who can remember when Little Richard was one of the young turks of the new, dangerous phenomenon known as rock 'n' roll. The gray heads and brand-name sweaters that filled the seats received a healthy dose of that old-time music. Richard benefited greatly from the talents of his 10-piece band, featuring two sax players, two guitarists, two bassists, two drummers, a keyboard player and a trumpet player. The band was allowed to show off its considerable talents through solos and wall-of-sound rave-ups.

Richard's set included a mix of his early hits ("Good Golly Miss Molly," "Lucille," "Jenny, Jenny") and others from the '50s (Fats Domino's "Blueberry Hill," Ray Charles' "I Got a Woman"), as well as a couple of newer songs honoring that era (the Rolling Stones' "It's Only Rock 'n' Roll (But I Like It)" and Bob Seger's "Old-Time Rock and Roll"). Richard's greatest exertion came when he imitated Mick Jagger's famous stage strut on "It's Only Rock 'n' Roll." The show's highlight, though, was a slower blues number. The raw, deep-felt timbre in Richard's voice meshed with the band's sturdy 12-bar beat to deliver a moving moment.

Richard's chart-topping success in the '50s nosedived when he claimed he dreamed an apocalyptic vision, quit playing music and trained for the ministry. When he tried to return to rock 'n' roll glory in 1964, the landscape had changed and he couldn't revive his career. But he continued to perform, eventually reconciling a life combining rock and religion. At Saturday's show, Richard largely kept his spiritual convictions to himself, although free religious tracts were handed out after the show.--Geoff Schumacher