Hank Ebert Special to The Roanoke Times

Lyle Lovett and His Large Band played for a crowd of 817 at the Roanoke Performing Arts Theatre on Saturday night.

A night out at a Lyle Lovett and His Large Band show is less a cohesive set and more a series of moments.

Some of those moments are quirky. Some are random. Some are amazing. All are underpinned by the presence of Lovett, a master songwriter and inspired interpreter of others' music. The Texan is very tuned in to what's happening onstage or off, and he's ready with a quirky witticism.

During a Saturday night show at Roanoke Performing Arts Theatre that lasted more than two hours, he and the band played at least 23 songs, both old and new. In between, Lovett improvised interactions with his 14-member band and with several among the 817 people who came to the 2,151-capacity hall to hear him.

The first nonmusical moment of the night came during the oddball existentialism of "Here I Am," from 1989's Large Band debut record. Lovett stopped the band after noticing a couple down front, dressed in Halloween finery, and introduced them to the crowd as "the King and Queen of Roanoke." He told them it had "been a while" since he had seen them, then went off on a monologue about how people change over the years, not always as they'd like, and that "sometimes our breasts are bigger."

There were too many of those moments to recount here. Clearly, though, he is not afraid to take a thing in a strange direction.

His Large Band, on the other hand, was a rock behind him. From the instrumental opener "The Blues Walk" to the two-step of "Truck Song" -- dedicated to folks who just don't understand why someone needs to drive a "man-size" vehicle -- to the open country sociological breakdown of "Natural Forces," this gang of top-shelf pros made it musically sweet. Pianist Jim Cox is a "professor" on the 88s.

Lovett, too, is a fine instrumentalist. His fingerpicking on the Townes Van Zandt song "Loretta" and his own, plaintive "Empty Blue Shoes" was touching.

Band members moved on and off stage as the show went on. A highlight came during the songs "Pantry" and "Up In Indiana," when it was simply Lovett, bassist Viktor Krauss, mandolinist Keith Sewell and violinist Luke Bullock. The only problem, gathered around one microphone, was that "your mouth is close to another man's mouth," Lovett said.