Santa Cruz Sentinel

Santa Cruz Style

Subscribe

With ‘Red Dirt Girl,’ Emmylou Harris delivers a stirring collection of her own compositions.

Emmylou’s the new material girl

Name: Emmylou Harris

Background: She possesses maybe the most familiar female singing voice in all of country music. Her arrestingly tender warble has shaped her career, but she also takes on countless background singing assignments.

Emmylou’s biography is almost as familiar as her voice: She was an acolyte of the late Gram Parsons, who staked out a rich territory between country, rock and folk in the post-Byrds 1970s.

Harris eventually became an icon of Americana and Mother Inspiration for a generation of women folkies, from Iris Dement to Gillian Welch to Roseanne Cash.

Current status: If you think you know Emmylou Harris, her latest release may throw you a curveball.

"Red Dirt Girl" makes for a late-career re-invention from a woman who has never paid much attention to convention.

Harris, who made her career on other people’s material, stretches out as a songwriter in a collection of surprisingly adept and supple compositions.

Produced with an eye toward mainstream pop balladry, "Red Dirt Girl" features lots of stirring mini-dramas of heartache, loneliness and betrayal. Much of the imagery is evocative of Irish ballads in its air of sweet despair.

As always, Harris is a genius at picking collaborators who bring out different dimensions of her talent. She shares a couple of song writing credits with old Texas cowhand Guy Clark and Jill Cuniff of the pop trio Lucious Jackson, as well as singing duo with pop star Dave Matthews.

The star here, however, is Miss Emmylou, who manages to follow in the footsteps of her own followers — like Dement and Welch — with a vivid collection of her own songs that deliver a wallop of longing and desire.

Sample lyric: "We are aging soldiers in an ancient war

Seeking out some half-remembered shore

We drink our fill and still we thirst for more

Asking, "If there’s no heaven, what is this hunger for?"

Trivia: Contributing background vocals to the song "Tragedy" on Emmylou’s new album is singer Patty Scialfa and her tag-along husband, Bruce Springsteen.

Rendezvous: Monday, 8 p.m.

The Catalyst, 1011 Pacific Ave., Santa Cruz

Tickets are $25 advance; $27 at the door.

423-1338.

Subscribe