EVERY SO OFTEN a performer comes along who reaffirms all that is great about live music.

The ambitious American is touring with a British band assembled from her label Tin Angel Records, notably Joe Carvell and Andy Whitehead; both superb. Sproule talked at the interval of spending too long touring to keep on playing the same types of song.

She seemed to revel in the freedom of a different set of musicians. Such was the empathy between them, the improvised setlist seemed to spur them to greater heights. Stylishly decked out in blue, Sproule showcased, and surpassed the recorded versions of songs from her new album – I Love You, Go Easy.

The wonderful first half shone with wit, variety and musicality. From excursions into the impressionistic folk / jazz terrain sketched out by Joni Mitchell on Hejira, to the sort of wordplay and idiosyncratic vocal stylings so beloved of Ricky Lee Jones and Jolie Holland, going as far as the unexpectedly louche groove of The Unmarked Animals (the name of her backing band). The second half was enjoyable and ultimately humorous, but didn’t scale anything like the same heights as Sproule concentrated mostly on her earlier, more conventional material.

Sproule is far more interesting than her country pigeon hole suggests, an artist bent on reinvention. For her sins, Sproule spends a great deal of time in the Midlands (where her label resides), and while by her own admission not the most prolific of songwriters, she has picked a clutch of great songs by lesser known writers – the pick of which was Anais Mitchell’s Flowers– and like those she champions, Sproule deserves far greater recognition.