IF you want to experience pure pop-music history, catch Neil Sedaka celebrating his new “Definitive Collection” CD set.
Sedaka has sold tens of millions of copies of such hit songs as “Calendar Girl,” “Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen,” “Breaking Up Is Hard To Do” and countless more he and others recorded.
With his large song selection. Sedaka showcased his clear, trademark high-pitched voice, providing genial and amusingly grandiose commentary between numbers.
“I have to look at my list,” he said at one point. “There are so many hits, I don’t know what to sing.”
Sedaka also showcased his more serious side with moving renditions of such numbers as “Solitaire” and “The Hungry Years.”
So wide has his influence been that the pop group Fountains of Wayne popped up the other night to provide backup harmonies on “Calendar Girl.” Don’t miss him.
Meanwhile, at Feinstein’s at the Regency, another pop icon from the past, Donny Osmond, is performing a photo op – er – show, to celebrate his new (55th!) recording, “Love Songs of the ’70s.”
Never have so many middle-age women squealed and taken as many photos as they did here the other night.
Accompanied by a funky five-piece band, Osmond worked the room like a pro, singing “Happy Birthday” to a fan named Bootsie and serenading “Tracy From Long Island” with “The Twelfth of Never.” He reprised his teen hits “Puppy Love” and “One Bad Apple,” but mainly showcased such cover songs from the new album as “I Can See Clearly Now” and “Sometimes When We Touch.”
But Osmond & Co. sounded like a well-honed covers band at a Holiday Inn lounge.
NEIL SEDAKA
Joe’s Pub, 425 Lafayette St.; (212) 967-7555. Through May 2.
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DONNY OSMOND
Feinstein’s at the Regency, 540 Park Ave.; (212) 339-4095. Through tomorrow.