I'm going to admit it upfront: Country music is not this critic's forte.

Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash I know, but I would be in big trouble if someone asked me to name one song by Travis Tritt or Toby Keith. So it was with some trepidation that I accepted the chance to check out "Nashville City Limits," the new country music revue that opened Friday at American Music Theatre.

I needn't have worried. As I joked with a friend who called me after the show: "Well, slap me with a 10-gallon hat and call me George W. Bush. I liked it!"

So will you.

"Nashville City Limits," which plays through June 19, makes country approachable to the neophyte and provides a good time for established fans, if audience reaction was any indication. And they had a lot to applaud.

Thirty-six songs are covered in a brisk, breezy two hours. There's no intermission, nor is one needed. As they say, time flies when you're having fun. Or appreciating talent.

"Nashville" is dominated by four singers — Wess Cooke, Julie Keough, Todd Mitchell and Michelle Rajotte — who run the gamut of country hits and run it well. They have a lot of territory to cover, from a rousing group rendition of Tritt's "It's a Great Day to Be Alive" to Cooke's take on Jamey Johnson's moving "In Color" to Mitchell and Keough's duet of Tim McGraw's "Southern Voice," which has to have some of the best lyrics of any song in any genre ("Aretha Franklin sold it/ Dolly Parton graced it/ Rosa Parks rode it/ Scarlett O. chased it.")

The duets especially shine. Mitchell and Rajotte's cover of McGraw and Faith Hill's "Like We Never Loved at All" sends chills up the spine. So does Rajotte and Keough's pairing for "Landslide" from the Dixie Chicks. In this number, they're joined by Erica Swindell, who spends most of the show wielding a mean fiddle. More on her later.

The evening's standout solo — and that's a tough call to make — was Cooke's salute to Keith's "American Soldier." Cooke and his deep, resonant voice, set against a backdrop of screen shots of Old Glory, could very well drive up military enlistments.

Sometimes, however, the Old School is best, and it's honored in the show's "Classic Country Greats Medley." Hank, Patsy, Dolly, Waylon, Willie and, yes, Tammy Wynette, all get their due. Is there anyone who doesn't like "Stand By Your Man?" And Cooke's solo of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" would do the Man in Black proud.

"Nashville" goes out with a bang, closing with a scorching cover of "The Devil Went Down to Georgia," first made famous by Charlie Daniels and again later by the Zac Brown Band. Here's where we pick up with the aforementioned Ms. Swindell. She literally burns up that fiddle of hers, stepping into a well-deserved spotlight. It's a moment that screams "star."

Perhaps the only sad note in "Nashville City Limits" is its timing. Nashville itself is struggling to emerge from a devastating flood. But the music in "Nashville City Limits" sends a hopeful signal that the capital of country will rise again, and endure.

That's something even a country novice can appreciate.

"Nashville City Limits" runs through June 19 at American Music Theatre, 2425 Lincoln Highway East. For ticket information, call 397-7700 or visit amtshows.com.