Judy Collins brought the clear beauty of her voice and the magic of storytelling to two sold-out performances at One World Theatre Friday night.

“I love Austin, and I love this theater,” Collins said. “It is very, very special.

The 7 p.m. audience at OWT seemed to agree with her, awarding her three standing ovations before she left the stage after a final performance of “Amazing Grace” that included vocal support from the audience.

Looking decades younger than her 71 years, Collins started her set with two of her iconic hits from the 1960s, “Both Sides Now” and “Someday Soon.” She followed with the 1966 Joan Baez hit, “Diamonds and Rust.” It was a powerful testament to the beauty of the human voice.

Proving that age has not diminished her ability to fly up and down vocal scales, she sang for more than an hour and a half, mixing old and newer songs with stories from her life. She took audience members on a ride through the last 50 years of American cultural history, starting with the tumultuous 1960s and continuing on right up to the stage where she stood Friday night. She seemed to captivate her listeners with inside stories about the music industry, her family and friends, including Baez, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Jimmy Webb and Randy Newman.

“Everybody always wants to know what it was like in the 60s,” she said. “There was this great convulsion of creativity that started in the late 50s, possibly from the war, possibly because of the way black Americans were being forced to live at the time, possibly from a lot of things.”

Collins OWT early show included a performance of the 1939 Harold Arlen song, “Over the Rainbow,” which forms the basis for her new children’s CD and book illustrated by Eric Puybaret. Collins held a book signing at Book People Friday afternoon to promote her new children’s book.