Talented bluegrass teenager transcends “prodigy”

Having traversed bluegrass circles for five years, this seventeen-year-old singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist is ready to transcend the “prodigy” label. Yet the fluidity of her singing, the depth of her songwriting and the confidence in her picking are still preternaturally poised for a high school senior. Her debut features eleven solo compositions played with a band that features legends of the acoustic string scene such as Jerry Douglas and Darrell Scott, and up-and-coming peers Samson Grisman and Alex Hargreaves. Jarosz doesn’t trade on her youth, singing in a voice richer than a teenager’s and writing lyrics whose poetry is that of a songwriter, rather than a high school class. The unbridled yearning in her songs is the only real mark of her age, as she dreams of finding love and aches with the opportunities she encounters. She turns into a jazz chanteuse for covers of the Decemberists’ bloody “Shankill Butchers” and Tom Waits’ “Come on Up to the House,” and picks mandolin and clawhammer banjo on a pair of original instrumentals. Jarosz avoids the precociousness of youthful talent by guiding listeners to focus on her talent, rather than her youth. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

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