Marilyn Maye brings cabaret to Tilles

She's a show-biz octogenarian for whom the word "retire" doesn't compute. Swan song? That's for the birds.

Tomorrow night, 83-year-old cabaret dynamo Marilyn Maye brings "Her Own Kind of Broadway" to Tilles Center for two shows. Regarded as a leading interpreter of the Jerry Herman songbook ("Hello, Dolly!" and "Mame," in particular), Maye makes her Cabaret at Club "T" debut direct from Feinstein's at Loews Regency, where she celebrated Herman's 80th birthday -- another octogenarian! -- with an all-Jerry program.

Maye, who revived her lifelong career in 2006 with a Mabel Mercer Society gig at Jazz at Lincoln Center's Rose Hall, is accompanied by a jazz trio, led by Long Islander Ted Firth on piano, with Tom Hubbard on bass and Jim Eklof on drums.

SEVEN DECADES OF SONG Maye, a native Kansan, made her first vocal splash as a preteen in a series of amateur contests in Topeka. Discovered in Kansas City by Steve Allen, she signed with RCA records and went on to appear on the "Tonight" show for a then-record 76 times. Ella Fitzgerald once called her "The greatest white female singer in the world."

Never a showgirl, Maye made a career as a jazz singer and cabaret conveyor of Broadway standards, embellishing them with a boomingly sensuous voice emanating from deep within.

Maye is also known for self-deprecating quips during her cabaret act. Noting that she went so far back on the "Tonight" show with Johnny Carson that Johnny was still in New York, she says, "My overnight success has been about working all my life."

Of her personal life, she says, "I've had three husbands and one meaningful affair. And now that I'm too old to be humble, the good news is that none of 'em worked.

"This is what I love," she adds, referring to singing.

She's also fond of twisting lyrics for a laugh. On "I'm Still Here," she's apt to sing, "I've been through Barbra Streisand -- and I'm still here." Or on "It Might as Well Be Spring," Maye jokes, "I'm as jumpy as a gentile in the Catskills."

HOMETOWN MUSIC DIRECTOR If Maye needs a place to stay after the show at Tilles' cozy Hillwood Recital Hall, we're pretty sure Firth, her main man on the piano, has a spare room. He and his wife live in Baldwin. Firth, also an arranger, has worked with a roster of stellar cabaret acts, from Karen Akers to Margaret Whiting, plus Broadway stars Brian Stokes Mitchell and Faith Prince, among dozens more. He's also recorded with jazz greats John Pizzarelli and Houston Person.

Meanwhile, his work with Marilyn Maye shows no sign of diminishing. "Why should I retire?" Maye asked herself during an ABC radio interview on her 80th birthday. "It's just not in my vocabulary."