It was star time at Madison Square Garden when Barbra Streisand arrived on Monday for her first of five nights in New York. Limousines ringed the block; her fans, who had paid $50 and much more for tickets, arrived in tuxedos, suits and evening dresses. Ms. Streisand hadn't given a concert in New York since 1967, and her tour ends here. For admirers, it's now or never.
At the Garden, the metal detectors were routine, but not the no-smoking rule, the gray carpeting under the orchestra seats (though the bleachers still had sticky floors), the champagne and roses for sale alongside the onion-rings concession, or the souvenirs like white dress shirts ($75) emblazoned with "Barbra Streisand: the Concert." Once in the arena, heads craned in search of celebrities: Alan King! Liza Minnelli!
The stage was set as a palatial parlor or a high-end Ethan Allen showroom, with busts of Shakespeare, Lincoln and Beethoven on the wall. Through the public-address system came announcements that no one would be seated while the orchestra onstage played the overture or the "entr'acte overture."
Pretentious? No one cared once Ms. Streisand appeared onstage, walking along a balcony in a white gown, holding her microphone like a wedding bouquet. When she started to sing "We Never Said Goodbye," her voice was creamy and tremulous, its power veiled in tones of vulnerability, gliding from note to note.
For much of the concert, Ms. Streisand chose understatement, holding back the syllable-torturing melismas that have been picked up by imitators like Mariah Carey, keeping her tone less brassy than it is on many of her recordings. The elegant, finely detailed orchestral arrangements had built-in crescendos, and Ms. Streisand rode them to milk applause from the audience, but she usually eased back before the song ended. She oversold only a few songs, among them "Evergreen." Most of the time, she brought a tender restraint to her most romantic sentiments.
Ms. Streisand's style is a Tin Pan Alley distillate, with distant echoes of her Yiddish-theater idols like Fanny Brice. Even with her New York accent, lightness is everything. She can be assertive or languid, but at some distance from the swagger or sultriness of the blues; she prefers floating to swinging, and when a song called for a bluesy turn, she borrowed inflections from Billie Holiday.
But the concert wasn't exactly a song recital. It was a kind of state visit with a woman who has proved herself as singer, actress, director and producer, and who is now returning in triumph to her most uncontroversial calling: the Tin Pan Alley songbird.
Ms. Streisand didn't only sing; she played the role of herself, sketching her achievements as film maker, mother and supporter of liberal causes. The concert traced her progress from spectator to star. In the first half, she talked about getting a crush on Marlon Brando, and sang a duet with his screen image from "Guys and Dolls"; in the second half, she showed film clips from "Yentl" and sang a duet with herself.
The audience, separated so long from Ms. Streisand in the flesh, delighted in promises of intimacy, whooping with delight at Ms. Streisand's New York trivia. But even while laying on couches and talking with the disembodied voices of psychiatrists, Ms. Streisand gave away nothing. (Perhaps by coincidence, the concert took place in two 50-minute segments, like two therapy sessions.) On video screens, Ms. Streisand showed her versatility, with a quick-cutting colloquy between her roles as doctors and patients. She also demonstrated her clout; a young Prince Charles shared her mug of tea.
During the second part of the concert, she grew heavy-handed in a defense of the Clinton Administration (followed by an oddly mournful version of "Happy Days Are Here Again") and with an earnest admonition about tolerance for diversity (followed by "Somewhere" from "West Side Story"). Before singing a new song about "ordinary miracles," she complained about "a shortage of optimism and hope" and explained, unnecessarily, that she was singing the song for its message. She was more appealing and spontaneous when, responding to loud protestations of love from the fans, she admonished, "Don't strain yourself."
Every arena concert is an exercise in star power, whether for rockers who claim to share it with the audience or for divas, like Ms. Streisand, who revel in it. Ms. Streisand's long absence from the stage coupled with her multimedia projects have given her more star power than anyone on the concert circuit, and that power is its own message. Long before Madonna, Ms. Streisand was her own mogul and packager, a feminist with dignity. And long before the latest surge of identity politics and ethnic pride, she both refused assimilation by nose job and went on to emphasize her Jewishness in projects like "Funny Girl" and "Yentl."
For New Yorkers, Ms. Streisand is the definitive local girl made good, and the concert offered a chance for fans to simultaneously applaud her and share her success. In the end, she was not just in superb voice, but also gracious while basking in her own fame.
