"This is my wedding dress," announced Sheryl Crow, decked out Monday night in a form-fitting white frock, adding, "It's Halloween, right?" The hit maker famous for her wounded but cool insouciance thus dispensed with tabloid buzz about her betrothal to the cyclist Lance Armstrong. But traces of the romance were noticeable. Ms. Crow's disco ball of an engagement ring sparkled in the spotlight, and midshow, Mr. Armstrong, the Tour de France winner, emerged from the wings to hand her a guitar and plant a lingering kiss.
Judging from the polite but not clamorous audience reception of Mr. Armstrong, Ms. Crow might be overestimating the level of interest in her personal affairs. Similarly, her string-soaked new album, "Wildflower" (A&M), dedicated to Mr. Armstrong, jags in a somber direction that fans of breezier hits might be loath to follow. "Wildflower" made its debut high on the charts, but it wasn't until seven songs into her set, when Ms. Crow played the standby "My Favorite Mistake," that the crowd rose to its feet.
Switching regularly from acoustic to electric guitar and then to piano for some of the newer songs, Ms. Crow reminded us that she's a comfortable, versatile player. Flashier guitar solos were handled by a tour sideman, Peter Straub, whose deliciously sad slide lines gave songs like the ballad "Strong Enough" added poignancy.
Ms. Crow has also been traveling with a 13-member string section, histrionically conducted by David Campbell (father of Beck), who on Monday wore tails over jeans. String parts were woven through all but two of the 22 songs, but despite Avery Fisher Hall's acoustic capabilities, it was often impossible to hear them. When they did swell over the band's workmanlike drums and overly hooty organ, they often competed with the flippant charm of Ms. Crow's older hits.
On "Leaving Las Vegas," the jocular anthem to escape, the string arrangement reimagined the song as a funereal trudge. Since Ms. Crow's delivery retained every bit of its original sass, this new backdrop weighed her down. The more complex arrangements predictably worked best on new material, like the mystical love song "I Know Why," and the New Age rumination "Chances Are." The antiwar song "Where Has All the Love Gone" also gained majesty from the instrumentation, as did "Letter to God," despite a distracting hair-blowing machine at the edge of the stage that made Ms. Crow look like an apparition out of "Salem's Lot."
For those of us who prefer nimble assemblages like "My Favorite Mistake" and the exquisite confection "Soak Up the Sun," shoutier smashes, like "If It Makes You Happy" and "Every Day Is a Winding Road," sounded strident live. But when Ms. Crow and her band got loose, as they did on both "Mistake" and Bob Dylan's gift song "Mississippi," it was clear that this kind of easy roll suits her best. All elements came together on her cover of Cat Stevens's "First Cut Is the Deepest," which appeared on her 2004 greatest-hits collection. This groovy balance of Ms. Crow's vocal conviction, Mr. Campbell's strings and the band's relaxed rocking was obviously the kind of perfect marriage her singing, swaying fans most desire.