Review | Sarah Jarosz Busts Out of Bluegrass and Broadens Her Reach

Unlike the fast fade of a Polaroid image, Sarah Jarosz has a voice that lingers long after she’s left the stage. Thursday’s show at the Lobero — the last leg of the first part of her band’s Polaroid Lovers Tour, in support of the new album with the same name — was somewhat of a triumphant return for the singer, who has appeared at the venue multiple times before as both a solo artist and as part of the talented trio I’m with Her, alongside Sara Watkins (Nickel Creek) and Aoife O’Donovan (Crooked Still).

Following an entertaining opening set by the Ballroom Thieves, the four-time Grammy winner Jarosz, who bears a slight resemblance to Aubrey Plaza, showed a confidence and command of her excellent band — Fred Eltringham on drums, Daniel Kimbro on bass, and Seth Taylor (who she said was single and was trying to get a date for after the show) on guitar and vocals — throughout a tight set that went from new material through some of her older work and even a beautiful, stripped-down version of “Kathy’s Song” circa 1960s, by Paul Simon.

Although she’s only 32, Jarosz released her first album in 2009 and quickly made a name for herself as singer-songwriter and mandolin player, and she has a large song list to pull from. She opened the show with “Jealous Moon,” followed by “When the Lights Go Out,” and “The Way It Is Now,” all from the new Polaroid Lovers album. “It’s been just incredible to play all these new songs live for the first time,” said Jarosz before launching into another new song, “Columbus & 89th” followed by “Green Lights,” a 2016 song that has the beautiful verse: “Up overhead the stars are burning / Gravity’s bending time and space / The galaxies are slowly turning / and we’re both standing face to face.”

One of my favorite moments of an evening filled with them, was a song called “Morning,” from the 2021 album Blue Heron Suite, a commissioned project from the FreshGrass Foundation that Jarosz wrote to honor her mother at a time when she was undergoing treatment for breast cancer. It’s such a pretty and heartfelt song to begin with, and was made even more so because Jarosz introduced it with a story about walking on the beach with Jan Crosby and the late David Crosby (whom she first met when he came backstage after one of her shows at the Lobero and the two became good friends), and they had a rare spotting of a blue heron. “Jan called it our Blue Heron day,” said Jarosz. It was the last time she saw Crosby before he died. 

Jarosz’s vocals were impressive throughout the show, but her cover of the Massive Attack song “Teardrop” showed them off the best, at least to my ears. That song from the 1990s has always been haunting (some will remember it as the opening theme for the TV show House), but Jarosz really showed off her range with this one. It was also the only song of the night she wasn’t playing either the mandolin, guitar, or banjo, simply singing her heart out. 

And wow can she sing. While her earlier work skews more toward Americana and bluegrass, her new work leans a bit more rock ‘n’ roll. But as this concert showed off, no matter what the genre, that girl can sing!