When Regina Spektor released her major label debut, “Begin To Hope,” this summer, she might have considered herself a victim of circumstance. A decade earlier, she probably would have been sprinkled with a granule of the music industry gold dust that settled over Lilith Fair, the all-female music festival that ran from 1997–99 and helped to launch the careers of recording stars like Jewel and Paula Cole.

Without that springboard, Ms. Spektor has taken the long road to wide exposure. In 2003, she was invited to serve as the opening act on a North American tour that featured the southern rock outfit Kings of Leon and was headlined by the Strokes. To be sure, a spot on the triple bill was its own stroke of good fortune — a lineup with more sonic street credibility than the atmospheric, folk-pop endemic to Lilith Fair. But during a late-October performance that year at Madison Square Garden’s 5,000-capacity Theater, Ms. Spektor had the air of a distaff “Schroeder.” As animated as the “Peanuts” virtuoso, she sat with her back arched over her piano, performing songs from “Soviet Kitsch,” a quirky, piano-heavy disc of anti-folk that stood in contrast to the Strokes’ disaffected sound of Parliaments and scuffed Chuck Taylors.

Although the band’s guitarist, Nick Valensi, had championed her, the singer seemed never to fully connect with the audience. But Ms. Spektor, who emigrated to the Bronx from Moscow when she was 9, has persevered, building a cultish following in the proceeding years — many of whom will be there to receive her when she returns tomorrow and Thursday for two dates at Town Hall.

After three independent releases, Ms. Spektor’s label, Sire Records, earned the distribution of Warner Brothers Records — major label support that afforded her the luxury of two months’ recording time. Liberated from the tick of the studio clock, Ms. Spektor, aided by producer David Kahne (Paul McCartney, the Strokes), experimented with the beats, percussion, and large-scale arrangements that give “Begin To Hope” its heft. The album is an enduring collection of tall tales and vocal pyrotechnics where Ms. Spektor is proved to be a raconteur nonpareil: Imagine Joni Mitchell’s “Songs to a Seagull” had Ms. Mitchell fled “California” for a dive bar in the East Village.

A classically trained pianist with a russet mane, Ms. Spektor has also drawn comparisons to another flame-haired musician.The singers share a passing resemblance but the comparison to Tori Amos is easily dismissed.For one, where Ms. Amos made confession her hallmark, Ms. Spektor throws her voice like a ventriloquist, so that one is never certain whether she is singing about herself or the concoction of an indefatigable imagination. She is sullen and punch-drunk on “Summer in the City;” borders on identity theft on “Lady,” for which she inhabits the raspy growl of Billie Holiday; then conjures Edith Piaf for “Après Moi.”

On “That Time,” she mines her downtown roots, expertly sneering her way through a spare, post-punk-inspired bit of nostalgia. And the lead single, “Fidelity,” finds a reformed commitment-phobe asking her lover to reconsider had they never met. Singing “it breaks my heart,” Ms. Spektor shatters the monosyllabic “heart” into a million little staccato pieces. “Fidelity” is an infectious pop song that begs to be performed live and whose companion video (Ms. Spektor’s leading man is a headless mannequin) has enjoyed rotation on MTV2 and VH1.

The growing presence of “Fidelity” on the music channels may be propitious for an artist whose coronation is finally due. Fans of Ms. Spektor who turn up at Town Hall — an intimate space that holds 1,500— should find that she has banished the ghosts of concerts past once and for all.

Opens September 27 (123 W. 43rd St., between Sixth Avenue and Broadway, 212-840-2824).