As Heather Nova stepped daintily on-stage, the fairy lights decorating the set cracked into life with a brutal-sounding "phutt".

Happily, it was to be the first and last moment of awkward gracelessness during an evening to swoon to.

The show was billed as "an acoustic evening with Heather Nova" but this was no cosy, folksy singalong session.

Lush and lovely as they are, Bermuda-born Nova's songs consistently pack an emotional punch.

Nothing Heals Me Like You Do and Nova's finest moment, the indecently gorgeous Walk This World, rocked as hard as any diminutive, pregnant woman wielding an acoustic guitar can be expected to manage.

Nova noted wryly that her growing bump made it difficult to hold her instrument and suggested someone invent a "maternity" guitar.

Perhaps it was her unborn child which prompted the posters pinned around the venue, warning spectators that the singer did not want anyone to smoke.

Unborn baby or not, though, the admonitions were fully justified by the fact it would be a crime to grime with nicotine fumes the delicate instrument that is Nova's liquid-glass voice.

Swooping, sad and sultry, her vocals curled their way inside and around each melody almost effortlessly, with You Left Me A Song and Let's Not Talk About Love especially winning.

As with Aimee Mann, another intelligent female singer-songwriter with a reliable ear for a classically crafted melody, it seems mind-bending that Nova is not a bigger star.