Susanne Sundfør @ Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh, 11 Mar

Susanne Sundfør is new in town. “We’ve got some time off tomorrow, where should we see in your beautiful city?” she asks the Edinburgh audience, before announcing she wants to see the “JK Rowling café”. It’s a curious mismatch for a singer whose own way with words sees her liken herself to the moon, a crow, a shark and finally the earth – and that’s just in the space of her opening track. On Can You Feel the Thunder she’s even more evocative, singing 'There was a matador, a king, he swang the muleta, every heartbeat was a scream.' 

Sundfør’s breakthrough record Ten Love Songs laid on the synths but her latest – Music for People in Trouble – is far more pastoral and it’s this version of Sundfør who takes to the stage tonight. Whether with solo piano or acoustic guitar, or her hugely impressive backing duo on clarinet, piano and flute, her voice is rich and emotive, almost too big for the theatre. On the countryish It’s All Gone Tomorrow, it takes on a gentle twang as her soundman skilfully toggles the reverb to send shimmers and shards of sound sparkling around the room.

Bathed in orange light, the Assembly Rooms looks grand and imposing, but it’s a perfect choice of venue with its impressive acoustics giving a polite but keen audience a masterful vocal performance. Yet as intoxicating as Sundfør’s vocals and delicate songcraft are, this is a show for rapt listening not enthusiastic participation.

As the set draws to a close, a few of Sundfør’s fellow Norwegians in the crowd make themselves known and some old favourites are teased out. White Foxes starts with Sundfør singing 'poses, poses, that’s all you are to me' and features some of her most head-spinning imagery, while closer Trust Me is a full-on torch song, cheekily laced with drug references.

If you came for the synth pop, you might be in for a surprise but for everyone else, Sundfør’s latest guise is just as compelling as ever.