The sound man is got up as Santa and a roadie is dressed as an elf. There's tinsel around the mic stand and an inflatable snowman, as big as a bouncy castle, sways tipsily at the side of the stage. "A Christmas Evening With Ed Harcourt" is how this one-off UK date is billed, and there is a warm, festive glow to the occasion - we even get Christmas cards as we go in.

But that - and a whimsical snow-spitting machine - is, thankfully, as far as the Yuletide business goes. It's not, as some music papers predicted, a rollicking knees-up around the piano. When Harcourt asks the crowd for requests and someone answers "Silent Night", he shakes his head, messing up his Ryan Adams-esque hair, and declines. He prefers to do something from his fine last album, From Every Sphere, or one of several strong new songs.

The 25-year-old's songwriting output appears every bit as prodigious as the aforementioned Adams, and as self-confidently diverse: from sensitive, wistful or dramatic ballads to Beach Boys-esque big pop, Beck-ish pop-Americana, 1970s rock and what sounds like Randy Newman playing jazz with Tom Waits. We get all of that tonight in an evening loosely divided into two parts. First, there is a (mainly) solo set: new and recorded material performed mostly at the piano, occasionally on guitar, and once or twice accompanied by a muted trumpet, lead guitar and soft, smudgy backing vocals (as on the lovely Sweetest Sound of All). Then there is a longer set with the full, four-piece band, Harcourt switching breezily between piano, guitars, keyboards and banjo (on the crazy but very good I've Been Misguided).

The venue could not have been better. The grandeur and rakishness of Bush Hall's ornate, chandeliered ceiling and the cigarette-burned carpet scattered with cross-legged students matches Harcourt's Sunday-best suit, wonky tie and casually passionate performance perfectly.