LeAnn Rimes opens the intimate SugarHouse Casino Event Center

Country's yodeling homewrecker, LeAnn Rimes, christened Philadelphia's newest live-performance venue Sunday in the glittering slots palace of the still-expanding SugarHouse Casino's Event Center.

Along with opening its 600-person concert hall, SugarHouse introduced its cosponsorship of country gigs with 92.5XTU and LiveNation at Camden's BB&T Pavilion featuring Dierks Bentley (May 14), Keith Urban (Aug. 26), Jason Aldean (Sept. 17), and more.

The low-ceilinged center, which has a wall of windows fronting the Philly/Camden waterfront, looked and sounded good. It was clear and cozy. "I love how intimate this is," Rimes said about the space before remarking on her proximity to the audience. "You're all right there."

The convivial Rimes' vocal talents, her soprano tone, and her emotional wellspring all have deepened over her career (her vocal range is just over three octaves). She hit the clarion highs of "How Do I Live" and its cosmopolitan chord changes with a quavering cry - an impassioned plea she had to grow into since first tackling the tune as a kid.

Rimes hit up the high, wide yodel she used familiarly on her old-timey first smash, "Blue." But she also dug deep for dips in the contralto vocal pool with a growl good enough to make a grunge-honky-tonk take on Kris Kristofferson's "Me & Bobby McGee" grungier and tonkier. Credit her taut, tough backing quartet for providing the raw and the silken - the latter especially on the piano-only "Love is an Army."

Starting with the smooth, drum-thumping ballad "Commitment," with its looking-for-love sentiment, and the punky hucklebucking "Nothing Better to Do" and its rugged reveal ("Just a crazy roughneck's daughter"), Rimes showed her hand quickly: a bicameral mind-set Tina Turner used to call "nice and rough." Rimes dug deep into her catalog-by-request and came up with exquisite plums: a breathless serenity prayer in "What I Cannot Change," a weepy "What Have I Done?" from 2013's wrongly ignored Spitfire, and a jazzed-up "Probably Wouldn't Be This Way," whose melody was reminiscent of the Police's "Every Little Thing She Does is Magic." A rarely performed Patsy Cline medley starting with a neo-doo-wop "If You've Got Leavin' on Your Mind" and ending with an a capella "Sweet Dreams" was but honeyed icing on a bittersweet cake.