A gleeful homecoming for Idina Menzel

For the mother of a 1-year-old, Idina Menzel sure gets around. And that's not even counting her fictional daughter on TV's hit series "Glee."

Aside from her current tour, which brings Menzel to a homecoming concert at Tilles Center on Saturday - Menzel grew up in Syosset - she's played for the president and first lady (you can catch "A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House" on PBS Oct. 20), performed at fellow Long Islander Michael Kors' Fashion's Night Out event in Manhattan ("I got to keep the dress," she says) and released an eponymous EP.

Menzel picks her spots on tour. "It's been hard for me," she says of leaving behind her son, Walker Nathaniel Diggs, who celebrated his first birthday Sept. 2, and her husband, Taye Diggs. "Being away for even three hours is difficult," she says in a phone interview in which the baby could be heard cooing. "He just started walking," she says, excusing herself to make sure he was OK scooting across the floor with a truck in one hand. Although Grandma and Grandpa no longer live in Syosset, Menzel has extended family on Long Island who are happy to dote on Walker.

NEW CLASSICS

For her Tilles gig, Menzel says she's working with "totally different arrangements. I'm used to singing in front of a rock band. Now I'm in front of this wonderful orchestra, singing Cole Porter tunes, old standards - swing stuff. It's a marriage of orchestra and voice to explore new interpretations of classics and some of my work." Her last full album, "I Stand," included 10 songs that she wrote. Of course, she can't get away with doing a concert that omits selections from the Broadway shows that made her a star: "Rent," for which she received a Tony nomination, and "Wicked," which earned her the 2004 Tony for best actress in a musical.

MOM, THE ACTRESS

As "Glee" opens another season on Fox, Menzel says she's waiting for a call about her recurring character in the series. Shelby Corcoran was introduced last season as coach of the rival glee club, Vocal Adrenaline. In an episode in May, we learned that Shelby is Rachel's biological mother, having answered a "womb wanted" ad from the teen's gay dads. Acknowledging that she's a bit young to be the mother of Lea Michele, 24, who plays Rachel, Menzel says, "The pros are better than the cons." Menzel is 39. "I can't deny that I didn't think of that," she says. "But then Rachel is a high school girl. Besides, I get to sing before such a wide audience."

WHAT Idina Menzel in concert

WHEN | WHERE 8 p.m. Saturday at Tilles Center, C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University, Brookville

INFO $47 to $102; tillescenter.org, 516-299-3100