Prog rock music is regularly derided as pretentious, and any act that takes the stage to Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite is clearly asking for trouble, but Jon Anderson (still sprightly, follically magnificent and defying time as he approaches his 82nd birthday), his dreadfully-named backing outfit The Band Geeks and an enraptured Symphony Hall crowd cared not a jot.

All were all here for the sort of self-indulgent, intricate, overblown magnum opuses that would’ve made noted critic John Peel run a mile – most songs (and I use the term advisedly) clocked in between 10 and 20 minutes long – which the assembled performers delivered in spades. And if it occasionally, ok regularly, felt a bit earnest and more like a recital than a rock gig, Anderson and his band were evidently enjoying themselves, and the audience, pin-drop reverential throughout, bestowed standing ovations on almost every tune.

Whether that was down to the joy of seeing the iconic singer again – the show was part of his first UK tour in a decade, as well as first since joining forces with the Geeks three years ago – or hearing near-perfect versions of seminal Yes songs is open to conjecture. What’s not up for debate is the quality of those renditions, which were arguably as close as you’ll ever get to the originals, all bar one of which date back more than five decades, with the sole exception turning 50 next year.

The current Yes line-up obviously don’t have Anderson’s unique voice and appeal (they also only contain one founder member in the shape of guitarist Steve Howe), while the Geeks, a covers band he discovered on YouTube, are more than capable of matching the originals’ musicianship note-for-note. Or rather notes, convoluted arrangements, fluctuating time signatures and more, the byzantine tunes more like symphonies than songs, with barely a chorus between them.

The one exception I’ve Seen All Good People (itself made up of two dramatically different parts) was one of the evening’s undoubted highlights – two brave souls in the front row even got up and danced throughout – and to these ears matched only by genuinely spectacular readings of And You and I, Awaken and set closer Roundabout.

The three original (non-Yes) compositions paled in comparison, but on a night characterised by indulgence it was perhaps charitable to give the musicians scope to do a bit of their own thing – after all, and as the ever-spiritual Anderson sang in the one brand-new song of the night, Giving Is Living.

4 stars

Reviewed by Steve Adams at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, on Tuesday 15 September.