Julio Iglesias Jr.
Cafe Carlyle
Through October 5

It’s to the credit of Julio Iglesias Jr. that he waits until he’s about 20 minutes into his show before singing “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before.” Even though both his father, Julio Sr., and younger brother, Enrique, are huge international singing stars, for most this is by far the best-known song by any of the three singing Señores Iglesias.  

If Julio Jr. were to sing it as the first number in his set, whatever followed might be anticlimactic; if he were to save the song for the end, it would seem like the whole show was in tribute to his illustrious paterfamilias. Thus, the best possible place for it is in the middle.

Some consider “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before” to be somewhat chauvinistic — even when Julio Sr. and Willie Nelson recorded their blockbuster duet single in 1983. Forty years later, well, the winds of change keep blowing, and while the text might be seen as politically incorrect, Julio Iglesias Jr. sings it with such tenderness and intimacy that there’s no accusing him of having anything but well-intentioned, warm feelings toward all of those past loves: “For helping me to grow / I owe a lot I know / To all the girls I’ve loved before.”

Indeed, Mr. Iglesias telegraphs his intentions for a casual evening of intimate and personal songs, opening his show by strolling onto the stage — he is probably the first headliner I’ve seen at the Carlyle who wears not a tuxedo variant but some kind of a relatively subdued tropical shirt — and launching into Lionel Richie’s “Easy.” A hit for Mr. Richie’s Commodores in 1977 and then later for the rock band Faith No More — who renamed it “I’m Easy,” not to be confused with the Keith Carradine song from the movie “Nashville” — the song is a complex mixture of emotions. Our relationship may be ending, it says, but “I’m easy, like Sunday morning.” 

Mr. Iglesias, who is constantly smiling, laughing, and chatting with the audience — even inviting us to sing with him — is the embodiment of ease on stage. To that end, he shares a few personal details; when he told his father he was booked at the Carlyle, Iglesias Sr. said to him, “I’ve made love to a lot of women in that hotel.”

The program is mostly pop and singer-songwriter hits of the ’70s onwards, such as Van Morrison’s “Have I Told You Lately That I Love You,” Sting’s “Every Breath You Take,” Billy Joel’s “Just the Way You Are,” and George Michael’s “Careless Whisper.” Further, there’s a well thought out mashup of two songs by Stevie Wonder, “Overjoyed” and “I Just Called to Say I Love You.”  

He also includes Gamble & Huff’s “Me and Mrs. Jones,” and references Willie Nelson again with “Crazy.” He tells a story about when Mr. Nelson visited the Iglesias family during the production of “To All the Girls,” with his signature headband and joint.

Señor Iglesias is especially winning when he sings love songs en Espanol, especially a classic trio of Mexican cantos romanticos, Gabriel Ruiz’s “Amor,” Armando Manzanero’s “It’s Impossible (Somos Novios),” and “Sabor a Mí” by Álvaro Carrillo.

His closer is “I’ve Got You Under My Skin,” which is not as left field as it may sound at first. When Cole Porter wrote it for the 1936 movie musical “Born to Dance,” he still had something of an Afro-Caribbean rhythm — as was heard in another of his songs from the time, “Begin the Beguine” — in the back of his head. At one point in “Born to Dance,” the song is performed by a pair of quasi-Hispanic adagio dancers billed as Georges and Jalna, and early recordings of “Skin” are often more bolero — an example of musica romantica — than straight foxtrots. Thus, Mr. Iglesias’s lightly latinate treatment of the tune is entirely appropriate.

Throughout, Mr. Iglesias is expertly accompanied by an ensemble led by his guitarist, Camilo Velandia, switching between the electric and acoustic instrument; Esteban Alberti, who likewise alternates between piano and alto saxophone; and percussionist Adrian Gines, who plays a very atypical, pan-American kit. There’s no bass, which contributes to the open, spacey feeling of the overall sound, but Mr. Gines occasionally supplies something of a bass part via a low-pitched cajon.

In all these songs — and stories — Mr. Iglesias makes you feel like he means it, as Mr. Wonder says, from the bottom of his heart. He uses more reverb on his vocals than any artist I’ve ever heard in this hallowed venue, and his pitch and his vibrato are especially secure and under control when he sings in Spanish. His confidence and charisma — as well as his upbeat optimism — never flag throughout. Heck, Julio Iglesias Jr. is easy, easy as Sunday morning.