I stand by my decision to brave Toronto's mid-July humidity to sweat it out a church pew for a Magnetic Fields show. It was worth it. But it was actually Andrew Bird's thunder-stealing opening act that sticks out as one of the finest performances I've ever been to.

He stepped out in front of a small army of amplifiers and startled the crowd -- to which he was almost entirely unknown -- with his impeccable whistling. Prolonged shrill sounds can be tough on the ol' ears, so luckily the man is no one-trick-pony. For the remainder of his six-song set, Bird's low-key chamber pop alternated between guitar, glockenspiel and the instrument he's most at home with -- the violin. And he didn't just do stripped-down versions of his songs, but put any previous usage of the term "one man band" to shame.

Using a small sampler, Andrew built up arrangements from a single loop to a mini-symphony. It's hard to capture with words, but it's easy to see just how extraordinary he is live.

His recordings don't capture the full extent of his concert prowess. But they're far from weak. In fact, all those in-person bells and whistles build actually build on the deft arrangements on his albums. Which brings us to his forthcoming long-player, Armchair Apocrypha and the first "single" from the record.

"Heretics" doesn't find Andrew straying too far from the style of his previous two releases, but between the gently plucked guitar, soaring harmonies and gratuitous violin lines, there isn't really any reason to wish he'd attempt a reinvention of the wheel.

And on an unrelated but completely wonderful note, when he's not crafting songs, he finds the time to guest on children's television. Here's Andrew as Dr. Stringz on Jack's Big Music Show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW8j7hIVoC0

Listen to this: "Heretics" by Andrew Bird.