John F. Kennedy had it. Martin Luther King Jr., Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton did, too, as did other presidents, populist preachers and statesmen throughout American history.

A way with words. More than words, actually -- a gift for stirring the soul and the heart, and more crucially, a voter's instinct to head to the polls on Election Day.

Is Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, whose own artful, powerful speeches thrilled audiences last week in Iowa and Tuesday in New Hampshire -- even as he lost to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton -- making great oratory politically fashionable again?

And does it matter?

"I've never heard anybody better than him," said former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo, whose own 1984 address to the Democratic National Convention is still cited as one of the best in modern political history, "except maybe [Israeli diplomat and politician] Abba Eban in his prime, and Obama's still young.

"People in this country are helpless and confused and down, and here comes this good looking young man, with no mark of imperfection, with nothing in his history to deter him, and when he opens his mouth, you don't hear words, you hear music."

Mr. Obama's electrifying speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention thrust him onto the national stage, and since then, he's polished and refined his gift to great effect.

Even in defeat, said Brown University historian Ted Widmer, who has written two well-reviewed books on presidential speechmaking, Mr. Obama is riveting, with loping repetitions and vivid language about hope and change, in a voice of surprisingly deep timbre.

"I loved his speech Tuesday" after conceding to Mrs. Clinton, said Mr. Widmer, who once worked as a speech writer for President Bill Clinton and supports Mrs. Clinton's candidacy. "It's right out of the black church oratorical tradition, but I also thought back to the spoken poetry of Homer. There is literally a musical quality to Obama's voice, a bit of a sing-song that he uses very skillfully."

But -- and this is a big but, according Mr. Cuomo and Mr. Widmer -- as the primary season clicks into warp speed over the next weeks and months, Mr. Obama will have to provide more substance. And Mrs. Clinton, who declared Tuesday night she had "found her voice" in New Hampshire, will have to find a more potent way to move voters than through her methodically delivered, densely substantive speeches.

Her misty-eyed moment the day before the primary provided a brief glimpse of emotional truth, but Mr. Widmer said he was surprised to see her reading her victory speech Tuesday night -- compared with Mr. Obama's invisible reliance on a teleprompter.

"There were good moments in it, but I don't think you can be seen to be reading a speech in a campaign, which is all about spontaneity," he said.

Rousing oratory is a long, cherished tradition in American political life, from Abraham Lincoln's addresses to a war-torn nation, William Jennings Bryan's fire and brimstone, JFK's bracing elegance, Ronald Reagan's warmth and Bill Clinton's fluent command of complex issues and easy empathy.

Even Richard Nixon, for all his moral failings, was a good speechmaker, noted Mr. Cuomo.

But there are other valuable tools of communication that political candidates on both sides of the aisle are using, with real success, other experts noted. Mrs. Clinton is an excellent debater. Mike Huckabee's folksy humor has captivated audiences, while Mitt Romney "is confident, clear and knowledgeable," said Kathleen E. Kendall, research professor in the department of communication at the University of Maryland.

"And John McCain has polished his town meetings to perfection. I've never seen anyone handle a town meeting better, with more humor or audience participation," said Ms. Kendall, who has spent extensive time in New Hampshire. "He not only takes questions, but encourages follow-up questions, too. He gives the impression of nerve and courage and is willing to talk about things he disagrees with in a civil way."

Indeed, in the wrong hands, pure "oratory" can backfire.

"Don't let anybody call you an orator," Mr. Cuomo said. "No dictionary would define that word without some suggestion of pomposity. People don't want oratory. People want to be moved."

Mr. Obama knows how to avoid those pitfalls, said Gerry Shuster, professor of political communication and presidential rhetoric at the University of Pittsburgh. Like another great communicator, Ronald Reagan, "he establishes direct contact with the audience, he communicates complicated ideas simply and he can adjust his tone to each situation."

Still, Mr. Obama "knows he can't just continue to go after the psyche, he has to go after the details of programs. If the pre-primary season is about establishing your electability, and the primaries are a family feud, the general election is where you have to get really specific about how you're going to handle the economy or the fuel crisis, and fluff won't do it at that point."

Mrs. Clinton will probably never be a great speaker, "but she can improve," Mr. Shuster added. "She has met hundreds of thousands of people in her life, and she needs to convey her deep knowledge of what she knows about everyday life in America. She needs to be well-informed but human."

Actually, Mr. Cuomo says he prefers Mrs. Clinton's speeches to Mr. Obama's.

"She's relentless intelligence. She's content, all content. And she's so different from her husband, the president, who's a thespian. She's a Methodist, even when she gives a speech."

Indeed, Mrs. Clinton made some of the same arguments Sunday in New Hampshire when she defended her earnest speaking style by saying, in an indirect reference to Mr. Obama, "you campaign in poetry, you govern in prose."

That particular political maxim was first uttered in a 1985 speech at Yale University-- by Mr. Cuomo.

"She didn't attribute it to me, although it's in Bartlett's Quotations and they did," the former governor said, laughing.

"But I also said prose is more important. The poetry is helpful, inspiration is wonderful and makes achievement easier, but perspiration and dedication are essential in this hard world of obstacles.

"Obama's speeches, though, aren't about the drab materialism of a budget. No, he is liquid, he is smooth, he is marvelous. ... And you listen to him and you say thank goodness, he is going to bring us all together, this African-American, white, Kenyan. He's perfect, we'll take it. We're not going to ask him how, we'll just take it," Mr. Cuomo said.

"He has surprised us with the inspiration, but he has only taken us to the beginning of the campaign. This is where we start, and now we need to know how he's going to do it. We need to know how they're all going to do it."