Sarah Jarosz To Return To Columbus For Show At Southern Theatre

Four-time Grammy Award-winner Sarah Jarosz will take the Southern Theatre (21 E. Main St.) stage on Wednesday, August 21. Jarosz and her band are touring in support of her new record, Polaroid Lovers.

Tickets start at $34 and may be purchased at the CBUSArts Ticket Center at the Ohio Theatre (39 E. State St.), online at www.capa.com or www.CBUSArts.com, and by phone at (614) 469-0939 starting at 10 am Friday, May 17.

The seventh album from Sarah Jarosz finds the highly decorated songwriter at the apex of change. A Texas native, she's spent most of her adult life living in New York City, but shortly before writing the album Jarosz left her adopted home to join her soon-to-be husband in Nashville. The geographic shake-up led to a sonic one as well for Polaroid Lovers. For the first time in her career, she opened herself up to collaborators, leading to writing sessions with Daniel Tashian, Ruston Kelly, and Natalie Hemby. The creative reorganization of her writing process evolved to include a much richer and more electric sound in the studio and being in Nashville meant access to a world of hot shot players.

As it goes with all change, Jarosz's major life events had her feeling contemplative. While sitting on the precipice of adulthood, Polaroid Lovers finds her reflecting on past loves, childhood dreams, the places she lived in and all the versions of herself that she's been. Although the listener experiences the sonic shift forward, the album's subject matter is a photo album of the past. Jarosz has never sounded more assured. Polaroid Lovers is filled with the kind of confidence that comes from hard won life experiences and the conviction of someone who truly knows herself.

The follow-up to 2020's studio album World on the Ground (winner of the Grammy Award for Best Americana Album) and 2021's song cycle Blue Heron Suite, Polaroid Lovers embodies a bold new vitality that has much to do with a deliberate shift in Jarosz's writing process and sonic approach.

"This whole album reminded me that I never want to play it safe — if anything, I want there to always be that element of being a little scared, because that means I'm taking a risk,” Jarosz said. “In a way that's what's so wonderful about art: if you're lucky, you never reach the finish line. You just keep searching and chiseling away at the stone, and putting everything you can into making something that tells the truth but hopefully leaves space for others to find meaning too."

Sarah Jarosz released her debut album at the age of 18 and was immediately nominated for her first Grammy Award. Raised in Texas, she began playing mandolin at age 10 and soon after guitar and banjo. Beyond her solo work, Jarosz joined Sara Watkins of Nickel Creek and Aoife O'Donovan to form the supergroup, I'm With Her, in 2018. The group released their debut album See You Around and won duo/group of the year at the Americana Awards. Their song, "Call My Name" won the Grammy for Best American Roots song.

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