1920s Berlin sparkles to life courtesy of Max Raabe and his orchestra

Ich bin ein Berliner.

A Berliner, however, in white tie and tails. Champagne in hand. A study in elegance, charisma and silkily ironic wit. A Jazz Age Berliner, that is, from the Weimar era.

Wait, sorry. I got a little carried away dreaming along to Max Raabe & Palast Orchester. Since the late 1980s, Raabe and his ensemble have been re-creating the sound of German hits as they were played in the cabarets and variety theaters of Berlin during the 1920s and early '30s — the years of the Weimar Republic.

(The Weimar Republic was a liberal democracy that replaced Germany's imperial government after World War I. The Weimar era, 1919-1933, was rich in cultural and scientific innovation.)

Reading years' worth of reviews and features from around the U.S. about Raabe and his 13-piece orchestra — who make their Benaroya Hall debut Tuesday — it's clear these artists perform songs from that lost period sans campy self-awareness or nostalgia. Instead, they demonstrate an astute and — Raabe believes — still timely appreciation of the high style, often subtle comedy and pop-music context of German cabaret before Hitler's ascension to power.

"When we started performing in Berlin," says Raabe by phone from Los Angeles, "audiences wondered, what is he doing? People were confused because I was just standing and singing, not running around and moving my arms. They wondered, is it a joke? After a while, they knew we don't take ourselves seriously. But the music, yes, we take very seriously."

On recording and in performance, Raabe's light baritone invokes the tenderness of Gatsby-era crooning. On stage, he wears a tuxedo and evinces a wry world-weariness in his unsmiling manner and patter. The effect, said a New York Times critic after a 2007 Carnegie Hall show, is that both German- ("Wenn Du von Mir Fortgehst") and English-language ("Cheek to Cheek") songs come across not as sentimental but emotionally true.

Which is not to say Raabe isn't having fun.

"The German songs from that time have wonderful humor," says Raabe. "Most songwriters were Jewish, and the songs were full of wonderful black humor and double meanings. That ended when the Nazis came. I prefer the music of the Weimar Republic."

Raabe created the Palast Orchester at the Berlin University of the Arts, where he studied to be an opera singer. He had expected to find in the city the sort of cabaret music his grandmother often described, but it was nowhere to be heard.

"I had a few stock arrangements of old songs," Raabe says. "I began looking for musicians among other students. We played in clubs while finishing our studies. We were going to go on to play in symphony orchestras and the opera when school was done, but decided it was stupid to stop what we were doing. We said, 'Let's go ahead as long as audiences want us.' I never thought this would be my main job. So it's a gift."

Tom Keogh: tomwkeogh@yahoo.com.