Sarah Brightman is just blowing through

Sarah Brightman’s performance Monday at Staples Center included several moments clearly defining the English soprano’s iconic appeal to her devoted listeners. In each, she stood on a tiny platform that was raised high above the stage as she sang, dramatically waving her arms as billowy waves of gossamer fabric from her gown formed an encompassing halo with help from a conveniently positioned wind machine.

As she was lifted into the air, the crowd let out a gasp of mesmerized astonishment. And one couldn’t help but wonder whether their reaction was similar to that experienced by the worshipping crowds of ancient Greece when they first encountered the monumental, gold and ivory, 40-foot-tall statue of Athena in the Parthenon. One thing’s for sure -- in both cases, colorful, larger-than-life presentations created an atmosphere of idealization and wonder.

In Brightman’s case, her new production -- “Harem World Tour ‘04” -- represents yet another step in her continuing evolution as a crossover world diva. As on her “La Luna” tour four years ago, the performance was rich with color, sound, costumes and stagecraft, and meager with musical substance.

Brightman’s singing has always had a split personality, girlish and airy on pop-oriented material, throatily simmering with operatic ambitions on the classical numbers. And this performance was no exception, as she sang Procol Harum’s “A Whiter Shade of Pale” (which, to be sure, does have a classical foundation in Bach’s “Air on the G String”) and Queen’s “Who Wants to Live Forever” via coyly phrased head tones, while switching to chesty theatricality for her renderings of Puccini’s “Nessun Dorma” (which she sang in Italian) and “Un Bel Di” (in English).

Of course, Brightman probably would be the first to note that her productions are neither pop concerts nor classical song recitals, that the musical extravaganzas of her former husband, Andrew Lloyd Webber, represent a more accurate model for what she is attempting to do. And in that sense, “Harem” -- with too many costume changes to count, atmospheric references to Middle Eastern music, eight dancers and dual orchestras, and stagecraft that both lifts and flies Brightman to acrophobic heights -- has to be counted a success.

But costumes, sets and grandiose ambitions can -- as several of Lloyd Webber’s musicals have proved -- quickly deteriorate into overkill. And “Harem,” despite the generally mundane qualities of its music, ultimately worked as well as it did because Brightman came across, not as an icon, but as a pleasant, likable performer -- to the point at which one really worried about how safe she was on those tiny platforms three stories up.