JAZZ REVIEW : Maxine Weldon: From Strength to Strength : The veteran singer, appearing in Newport Beach, sticks with what she does so well--foot-tapping blues and slow, earthy ballads.

NEWPORT BEACH — Just like the folks in the beer commercials from a few years back, Maxine Weldon goes for the gusto. Her renditions are never short on impact.

Weldon, who appeared with her trio Friday at the Cafe Lido, works with assurance. She knows her strengths and plays to them. In her first two sets, the veteran singer specialized in direct, communicative interpretations of basically two song forms: medium-tempo, foot-tapping blues tunes and slow, earthy ballads.

She sang about a half-dozen of each, accompanied with panache and poise by pianist Lanny Hartley, bassist Louis Spears and her 15-year musical associate, drummer Washington Rucker.

Both ballads and blues made good grist for Weldon’s vocal mill. The statuesque singer, who wore a violet gown with sequined sash and black beaded borders, has been gifted with a dynamic alto voice that can recall the considerable power and luxuriant tonal timbre of the great Dinah Washington.

Weldon could sing quite softly and not lose an iota of her resonance, as she did on some phrases of “Don’t Misunderstand” and “Just for a Thrill.” But when she let loose and really nailed a note--as in her ending phrases on “Try My Lovin’ One More Time”--her sound swelled magnificently, rarely losing its grandness and growing brittle.

She was also rhythmically sure-footed, hitting some phrases so crisply you’d think she also played the drums. This rhythmic acumen allowed her to improvise with a tune’s lyrics, shift her rhythmic course a tad and then always find her way back home.

Weldon exhibited most of her skills, particularly her facility for embellishing a lyric, on one of her ballad favorites, “My Romance.” The Richard Rodgers-Lorenz Hart standard is from the 1935 Broadway musical “Jumbo,” a show that produced another evergreen--”The Most Beautiful Girl in the World.”

Doing the tune at a slow gait, the artist took the words of the title on the second chorus and sang “My” with five descending tones, where Rodgers wrote one. Later, on the lyric “I don’t need a castle rising in Spain,” she took the word “rising” and stretched it out over several beats, as if it were made of rubber.

She closed the number with a boisterous crescendo, singing the penultimate lyric--”My romance doesn’t need a thing”--as written, then nudged it up a half step, then brought it back to its original position. Weldon wailed out the final words, “But you,” hitting the “oooo” echo five or six times as the band added flourishes behind her.

The blues, either in its distinct 12-bar form or in musical spirit, kept popping up like a jack-in-the-box. “That’s Life” was done as if it were a blues tune. Weldon ended it with the words, “Yeah, yeah, that’s life . . . all right,” singing them Ray Charles-like and with consummate blues feeling. “Your Place or Mine” was 12-bar blues, and here the vocalist swung hard, using body inflections as well as her voice to make her points.

Weldon has expressed a fondness for country music, but at the Lido she limited that genre to a pair of selections, though both were telling.

“Can’t Help Falling in Love With You,” which Elvis Presley took to No. 2 on the Billboard Pop charts in 1961, was done at a crawl and oozed over with feeling. As Weldon has said, there’s a thin line between country music and blues, and her rendition proved the veracity of that remark.

Weldon’s band made her sound even better. Hartley, a dynamo at the piano, chose his backing lines with deftness, supporting the singer firmly while adding richness to the presentation. In his solo spots, he played with authenticity and verve. Spears and Rucker acted as the hard-working cogs in this smoothly oiled music machine.

If there was any drawback to Weldon’s performance, it was an excess of her chief asset--impact--and a shortage of subtlety. “Just for a Thrill,” done in a tender, touching way, made up partly for this lack, as did portions of “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” But she would be wise to trust her instrument, and her sense of emotion, and take it easy for at least a couple of tunes a set. The relaxation would be welcome.

* Maxine Weldon performs again Friday, 9 p.m. to 1:30 a.m., at the Cafe Lido, 501 30th St., Newport Beach. $5 cover charge. Information: (714) 675-2968 or 673-5056.