Willie Nelson celebrated his 75th birthday last month with a typically energetic burst of activity. In the shops you can find a new studio album (Moment of Forever), a new live album with Wynton Marsalis (Two Men with the Blues), a new Greatest Hits album (Legend, his first to reach the UK Top 20) and a monstrous 100-track boxed set (One Hell of a Ride).

But it is out on the road that the real story of this enduring performer continues to unfold, as Nelson navigates his own, even longer-running version of Bob Dylan’s never-ending tour. His latest visit to Britain ended with this show at the Apollo, which found him and his band of old regulars holding forth with gruff charm and a deceptively nonchalant ease.

Armed with a huge repertoire ranging from country standards and easy-listening hits to obscure Western swing instrumentals and one or two new songs, Nelson worked his way through the selections with a quick, nimble touch. With his long mane of grey hair at first covered by a big black hat and then encircled with a bright red bandanna, he radiated an unmistakable sense of wellbeing. His voice may be a little gnarled these days but his emotional touch was as firm as ever, ranging from the gentle melancholy of Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain to the sure-footed autobiographical humour of Me and Paul.

With his band’s instrumentation comprising one snare drum, a little additional percussion, piano, harmonica and bass, the sound was sparse and authentic. Even performances of middle-of-the-road standards such as Help Me Make it Through the Night and You Were Always on my Mind had more of the intimate flavour of a Mexican bar band or a campfire singalong than that of a veteran international superstar on a big theatre stage.

While his voice wove a predictably seductive spell, Nelson’s guitar playing was a revelation. Playing a battered, scraped old acoustic, he soloed and swung like a jazz musician, incorporating lots of fast chord changes and odd grace notes with an original and fluent style.

Ending with You Don’t Think I’m Funny Any More – which only proved the reverse – he responded to the tremendous ovation by throwing his bandanna into the crowd. Plenty more where that came from.

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