“I think the first documented video of me singing is when I was 2,” Jarosz says. “It’s something I’ve done all my life.
“When I took up the mandolin for the first time, there was no looking back,” she says. “I fell in love with it. Other instruments came along, as well as writing my own songs.”
In May, Jarosz will graduate from the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston with a Bachelor of Music in contemporary improvisation, but she’s been performing and touring for years.
On April 5, the Sarah Jarosz Trio will open for the David Grisman Folk-Jazz Trio in a Savannah Music Festival original concert. Her trio first appeared at the festival in 2010. “I’m really looking forward to getting back to Savannah,” she says.
In addition to touring all over the United States, Jarosz has toured the United Kingdom and Canada with fiddler Alex Hargreaves and cellist Nathaniel Smith.
Jarosz began singing and playing in her hometown of Wimberley, Texas. She was 9 when she got a mandolin for Christmas and picked up the clawhammer banjo and guitar along the way.
“It was probably a combination of having heard the mandolin in recordings while growing up and liking the sound of it,” Jarosz says. “Also, as a young girl, it was not the obvious choice, and I kind of liked that about it. Being a little girl playing music, the small nature of the instrument fit me.”
By the time she was 11, Jarosz was performing outside of Texas. She began traveling the festival circuit and in 2007, was signed to Sugar Hill Records.
Her parents have encouraged her all along the way.
“My mom has been a singer and guitarist and songwriter just as a hobby,” Jarosz says. “My dad is a huge music lover. Both of them have showed me so much music I’ve grown to love. They’ve always taken me to live shows and always had music around the house.”
The musicians Jarosz has encountered also have encouraged her.
“I found out about a weekly Friday night bluegrass jam at home in Texas,” she says. “There was an open community aspect of the jam, and I was encouraged by other people to get into it, love it and get better.
“I also attended festivals and camps early on. It seemed to be the kind of music that paved the way for different musical styles.”
Jarosz was a high school senior in 2009 when she made her debut album, “Song Up in Her Head.” Two years later, she was a student at the New England Conservatory when she released “Follow Me Down.”
Both albums received Grammy and Americana Music Association nominations.
Read more: http://savannahnow.com/do/2013-03-28/sarah-jarosz-returns-music-festival-open-david-grisham-folk-jazz-trio#.UVQIvr_hEhQ
