ray manzarek.

During the lifespan of The Doors, Ray Manzarek managed the impossible. He fashioned an instrumental voice that stood out in a band fronted by one of the most outrageous singers of his day. Such was the duality that made Doors music so compelling.

Jim Morrison may have been the rock star, the one who fascinated and confounded as the band’s focial point. But Manzarek was its musical conscience. Designing keyboard melodies that owed as much to classical and jazz as they did to pop, he often anchored Doors songs with a groove that would hold fast as Morrison raged.

On any number of Doors hits, it was Manzarek you heard first. Soul Kitchen, When the Music’s Over, Strange Days, Touch Me, Light My Fire and, most profoundly, Riders on the Storm, all began with a keyboard prologue that pinpointed a mood and motive before Morrison sang a note. And on two of the band’s wildest works – Crystal Ship and Unknown Soldier – Manzarek and Morrison began in unison, engaging in a quiet but pronounced musical communion.

Many forget that The Doors went on to cut two albums after Morrison’s death – 1971’s Other Voices and 1972’s Full Circle. While paling understandably in contrast to the Doors’ heyday records, both are still worth seeking in second hand stores out for keyboard colors that remain distinctive even without Morrison’s dark poetics.  

A few post-Doors delights peppered Manzarek’s later career. As a producer, he was at the helm for Los Angeles, the 1980 debut album by the vanguard punk band X. And during the mid ‘80s, the keyboardist struck up a curious alliance with Brit pop stylists Echo and the Bunnymen. Together they cut a highly faithful cover of the Doors’ People are Strange, which was buried on the soundtrack to The Lost Boys, and a fun, Doors-like original, Bedbugs and Ballyhoo.

Is there one essential Doors album to commemorate Manzarek with? Let’s sign off with two. Try any of the band’s many anthology sets, but augment your pick with 1971’s L.A. Woman, Morrison’s swansong album. It remains an alternately sleek, serene and deliriously earthy monument to a rock troupe riding out the final tide of a majestic storm.

joe louis walker.

The most enjoyable tapings of the WoodSongs Old-Time Radio Hour revolve around featured performers that are distinct to the point of being stylistic opposites. The magic then comes when a level of common ground is discovered – or, in some cases, simply stumbled upon – that is a surprise to the artists as much as their audience.

Such was the case last night when blues guitarist Joe Louis Walker, who performed with gospel fervency within a highly electric quartet, and Americana songstress Aoife O’Donovan, whose solo acoustic set possessed a delicate but almost incantatory urgency, shared the WoodSongs bill at the Lyric Theatre.

Walker, a recent inductee into the Blues Hall of Fame, obviously reveres the great Buddy Guy. While little of the elder stylist’s monstrous tone was appropriated, Walker promoted a cheery, rockish accessibility within songs like Too Drunk to Drive Drunk (which was performed twice, with the second version unleashing the evening’s most assertive guitarwork) and Ride All Night.

aoife o’donovan.

But it was during  Soldier for Jesus that Walker’s vocal drive, a singing style drenched in the kind of gospel/R&B bravado that has long been integral to Guy’s music, was placed front and center.

O’Donovan, whose debut solo album, Fossils, is still three weeks away from release, is poised to be the next celeb performer in Americana music following tours this summer with Garrison Keillor and Yo-Yo Ma’s all-star Goat Rodeo Sessions. You could detect a different recent why in each of the five fine Fossils songs she performed.

Red & White & Blue & Gold reflected subtle folk melancholy, Fire Engine emphasized the hushed urgency of her singing, Beekeeper mixed New England coffeehouse folk intimacy with ‘70s-era West Coast folk expression and Lay My Burden Down proved an exquisite showpiece for captivatingly quiet vocals that navigated tricky melodic turns with schooled cool.

But the show stealer was Oh, Mama – Fossils’ finale tune – which bloomed into a very impromptu Band-like jamboree. Keyboardist Eric Finland (from Walker’s band) supplied a solo full of churchy calm before Walker chimed in with leisurely slide guitar that fell right in line with the folk-roots groove that sat at the heart of O’Donovan’s charming song.

Aoife O’Donovan.

It has become fairly standard practice these days for a musical artist to exhibit – or at least, promote – a stylistically diverse artistic agenda. It could be a country artist embracing pop, a classical soloist moonlighting in jazz or a folk singer advocating the blues.

If you were to simply glance at her dossier, you might suppose Aoife O’Donovan was a champion at such genre-hopping. In recent years, while maintaining strong visibility with the Boston-based Americana troupe Crooked Still, she has collaborated with jazz trumpeter Dave Douglas, members of the multi-directional string group Punch Brothers, and the all-star chamber crossover quartet Goat Rodeo Sessions (which counts world class players Yo-Yo Ma and Punch Brother Chris Thile among its personnel).

But here is what sets O’Donovan apart from her contemporaries: instead of catering to collaborators: Her singing – a hushed, folk-fortified vocal sound full of powerfully emotive yet unassuming color – remains a refreshing constant.

“My role in all of these projects has been very consistent,” said O’Donovan, who performs at Monday night’s taping of the WoodSongs Old-Time Radio Hour at the Lyric Theatre. “I think that’s why I’ve stepped into a lot of different genres while retaining my own sound.

“I’m not the kind of collaborator who is going to step into a Dave Douglas record and all of a sudden start sounding like a jazz singer. I’m going to do what I do within the context of the Dave Douglas Quintet. Or I’m going to do what I do within the context of Goat Rodeo. I’m going to try and lay my sonic palette over the top of what they’re doing and then blend it all together.”

That speaks volumes for artists’ esteem for her singing. But after a decade with Crooked Still and a fistful of critically lauded collaborations, O’Donovan is finally ready to place priority on her name, her voice and her songs. On June 11, she will issue her debut solo album – a 10-song set of all-original music titled Fossils that is being regarded as one of the year’s most anticipated Americana releases.

“Definitely one of the things I’ve really enjoyed throughout my career is having a lot of different focuses. Now I’m very excited to be focusing on my solo album, the one thing that’s really been on the back burner for the last decade.”

Much of O’Donovan’s music seems shaped by her distinctive singing, but her writing has hardly gone unnoticed. Fossils’ opening tune, Lay My Burden Down, was first cut by Alison Krauss on her 2011 recording Paper Airplane. One can detect similarities in the understated vocal approach of both artists. But the songs define the difference throughout Fossils.

Shades of Joni Mitchell surface on Pearls, hints of ’70s-era Laurel Canyon folk-rock are draped over Glowing Heart, and the album finale of Oh, Mama is ripe with rustic waltz accents that bring to mind The Band.

“I am by no means prolific,” O’Donovan said. “But the songs on this record all came out with a mind of their own. And I think they have a common thread. Some of them might go in a slightly more folky style, and some of them might go with more of a Celtic influence or a jazz style or a singer-songwriter style. It really depends on the song. But I definitely don’t plan it out in advance. I don’t say, ‘I need to write this kind of song.’ It just kind of happens.”

Still, you can’t help but think – especially in the way her singing sweeps over electric shores in what might stand as Fossils’ finest song, Beekeeper – that writing and O’Donovan’s extraordinary vocal phrasing go hand in hand. That was certainly the case with the artists she grew up listening to.

“I remember learning Kate and Anna McGarrigle songs and Joni Mitchell songs. I mean, does anybody phrase anything like Joni Mitchell? And Paul Simon, who I always thought was one of the most underrated singers. Of course, he’s this highly rated songwriter. But the way he phrases on a song like Hearts and Bones is just beautiful. That, in a nutshell, is how I want to sing.”

“But I’ve also been a songwriter ever since I can remember, although it’s been hard to admit that to myself. Still, to this day, instead of describing myself as a singer-songwriter, I think of myself as a singer who writes songs. It’s a different thing.”

Aoife O’Donovan and Joe Louis Walker perform Monday night at 7 at  the Lyric Theatre, 300 East Third for the WoodSongs Old-Time Hour. Admission is $10. For reservations, call (859) 252-8888.

todd rundgren.

Well, you can’t say Todd Rundgren didn’t warn anyone. The first words out of his mouth last night at Bogart’s in Cincinnati could have served as a mantra for his entire career, but they held especially true for the wildly indulgent performance at hand: “I am what I am.”

Familiar as that saying is, it also served as the opening line to Rundgren’s new indie album, State, which half of the program’s repertoire was devoted to. Take your pick as to which might have seemed more unsettling – the fact that State’s music is drenched in electronica-heavy dance beats or the idea Rundgren had of using such rave-friendly dance sounds as the basis for the entire performance.

He brought along two long-time bandmates – guitarist Jesse Gress and drummer Prairie Prince. But with very few exceptions, both, like Rundgren, were subservient to the show’s heavily computerized drive. In short, the better portion of the music was essentially canned. That didn’t seem to bother the crowd – heavily populated by 50 and 60-somethings – half as much as being showered with music they had never heard.

Frankly, that element proved quite intriguing. Good for ol’ Todd for not staying mired in the past. For those patient enough to hang tough with the State songs, there were rewards. Groove-dominate as the music seemed, it was still graced with plentiful pop hooks and a melodic sensibility that shifted from the contemplative (the set-closing Sir Reality) to the tensely textured (Ping Me) to the purely celebratory (Party Liquor). And while you couldn’t always tell underneath the live beats and synths, there was considerable humor in the new tunes, as well. “You shall receive what you deserve” sang Rundgren under the party funk of Serious. “Since you been dancing on my last nerve.”

It was in the delivery of this dance floor pop that things became problematic. Watching a truly pro groove merchant like Prince do little more that color a static, pre-established beat was a little painful. Same with Rundgren. While he obviously got a good aerobic workout leaping about in an effort to sell the crowd on the idea of a rave, his live musicianship was limited to two brief guitar solos at the start and end of the set.

Any concert that restricts Rundgren’s guitar time operates creatively in the red. In that respect, this program hemorrhaged.

The Time Jumpers

The cheer that burst forth from the music of The Time Jumpers last night at the Lexington Opera House was in no way subtle. You heard it in the scholarly but often carefree musicianship, the commanding but unassuming singing and the glossary of traditionally minded songs and styles this 11 member pack of Nashville all-stars could summon on a whim.

And then there were those moments so uncalculated but still so overtly upbeat that you couldn’t help but get swept up in the fun. Take, for instance, when Dawn Spears, one of the seven group members that took turns on lead vocals, announced she was going to sing a sad country song only to collapse in a fit of laughter so sustaining that reinforcements had to be called in.

Luckily, The Time Jumpers had plenty. Fiddler and de facto group leader Kenny Sears (Dawn’s husband) summoned Ranger Doug Green (of Riders in the Sky fame) to sing the sublime Western reverie Ridin’ on the Rio, one of five tunes offered from the group’s 2012 self-titled sophomore album.

But the giggles hardly got the best of Dawn Sears. She followed with the 1983 Vern Gosdin hit  If You’re Gonna Do Me Wrong (Do It Right), a solemn blast of traditional country heartbreak that was almost operatic in intensity. Not a bad trick, especially considering she was seated last night next to Vince Gill, who isn’t exactly a slouch of a singer himself.

That was the evening’s lone confessional, its only thematic ill wind. The rest of the near two hour show was devoted to music with a fluidity that was almost orchestral in design and a musical temperament that was continually sunny.

Two luminous examples were the instrumentals All Aboard and Texoma Bound, workouts that emphasized the band’s trio of fiddlers (Kenny Sears, Larry Franklin and Joe Spivey). Similarly good natured and free spirited was Kenny Sears’ Nothing But the Blues, a wry but light-as-a-feather dismissal of depression (“When my baby left me, I thought that I would die… but I didn’t.”), and the continually fascinating solo turns taken by pedal steel guitarist Paul Franklin.

Gill got his two cents in with Six Pack to Go, which was served as a leisurely blues light on desperation and high on the playful, animated solos and melodic runs that helped define The Time Jumpers’ tradition-minded, retro-inclined Americana fun. 

Kenny Sears of the Time Jumpers.

Country and Western music will forever be known as the sound that raised heartbreak to an art form. It was a soundtrack readily suitable for taking a swig off a longneck before heading off into a sobbing spell.

Western swing, on the other hand, inhabits the opposite universe. It might just be the cheeriest sound in the cosmos. Song lyrics and story lines occasionally flirt with the blues. But when multiple fiddles, spry guitar and animated pedal steel collectively sweep alongside schooled but equally playful vocals, the effect is unavoidably stimulating.

In short, when Western swing sings, there is simply no way you can wind up in a bad mood.

“It won’t let you feel down at all, will it?” Kenny Sears asked.

And he should know. For nearly 15 years, the fiddler has been at the forefront of a troupe called The Time Jumpers, an after-hours sanctuary band where some of Nashville’s top pickers brush off the more contemporary and commercial demands of their 9-to-5 music careers for weekly performances centered around the Western swing popularized in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s.

But after two albums, both of which earned Grammy nominations, Sears decided it was time to prioritize the band and send it on the road. That’s no easy feat when your group is 11 members strong and includes a few celebs unaccustomed (but eager) to taking back seat roles in an ensemble that’s not exclusively their own.

“There’s so many of us and we’re all very busy with our own careers,” said Sears, who will lead The Time Jumpers in concert Tuesday night at the Lexington Opera House. “But it seems to be kind of shifting over a little bit now and looking like maybe The Time Jumpers project might end up being something a little bit more than fun and games.”

Among the celebs in the current Time Jumpers lineup are vocalist Dawn Sears (Kenny’s wife), steel guitar great Paul Franklin, bassist and frequent T Bone Burnett collaborator Dennis Crouch, and vocalist/guitarist/Riders in the Sky frontman Ranger Doug Green. There is a big leaguer, too: vocalist/guitarist and multiple Grammy winner Vince Gill.

“We’re fortunate enough to have, in my opinion, two of the greatest singers in the world in the band. I’m talking about Vince and Dawn. I think it just doesn’t get any better than that, vocal-wise. So I’m spoiled. I can’t imagine doing this without them.”

For Sears, Western swing has always been at hand. A Texas native, he grew up on a farm in southern Oklahoma and was surrounded by the swing sounds of Spade Cooley, Hank Penny and especially Bob Wills. Having received a full scholarship from North Texas State University, he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music by 1975 and performed as a violinist with the Dallas Symphony. But the lure of the Western swing music he loved trumped classical instruction, so off Sears went to Nashville, to play in the Grand Ole Opry.

“We didn’t listen to classical music much in my family household,” he said. “I was looking for a fiddle teacher when I was a kid, and there weren’t any. So I ended up with a classical violin teacher. That’s how I got introduced to classical music. I learned to love that, too, along the way. I spent some time in the symphony and all that. But the real roots were always in Western swing and traditional country shuffles. That was always my first love.

“I couldn’t wait to get out of college and get to Nashville and start playing that kind of music. Fortunately, for me, I got here at a time when that music was still being played. I moved to Nashville in 1975, so my first job was with Faron Young. I got to work with Ray Price, Mel Tillis and lots of people that were still doing that music. So it was a wonderful thing for me.

“Then there were several years that went by when the styles changed. You know, I like the modern country music, but it just doesn’t touch my heart like traditional music. So when we had the idea to put together this band and play swing, it was like Christmas for me.”

Interest (and the Grammy nominations) for The Time Jumpers’ 2012 self-titled sophomore album prompted the current tour. Beyond that, Sears is confident that the band’s profile will continue to grow. There are obstacles, though. Dawn Sears is undergoing treatment for lung cancer (she still plans on performing with the band in Lexington). There also are  the careers of the other members to consider. But Sears said interest is strong enough to dictate that swing time for The Time Jumpers is far from over.

“I always wished for a career where I could play the music I love with people I admire and then grow old on the Grand Ole Opry. And for quite a while, I’ve gotten to do that. And then here comes along The Time Jumpers, and I just never even dreamed of that. This is just the best of the best.”

The Time Jumpers perform at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Lexington Opera House, 401 W. Short St. Tickets are $45.50 and $55.50. Call 1-800-745-3000, (859) 233-3535, or go to Ticketmaster.com.

“Bad day for a replay, so I’m skipping the downside,” Randall Bramblett moans at the onset of his ninth and newest album of scholarly Southern soul. “Lizard in a whirlwind, monkey in a trash bin, … and that’s just the bright spots.”

Hence the record’s title – The Bright Spots, a record perhaps more blues in tone than in temperament. After all, the aforementioned tune’s sense of despondency turns almost playful once it gets shoved next to looped cowbell chatter, stuttering brass and a massive chorus that spreads the song’s single-word title over the groove like butter on burned toast: Roll. Yep. That’s what you do when the blues hit.

The Bright Spots is a sublime glance at how Bramblett rolls. For more than three decades, he has been the quintessential Southern stylist: a writer with a storytelling ability that favors dark but humane detail, a singer with just enough scratch and weariness in his singing to ignite the soul and blues spirits in those songs, and an instrumentalist whose playing on keyboards and saxophone establishes and expands numerous Southern soul traditions.

All of that holds true and then some on The Bright Spots. It’s Southern. It rocks. But don’t label it as Southern rock in any conventional sense.

In the lighter moments of The Bright Spots, Bramblett summons R&B and soul accents that uphold the music’s deep tradition without pandering to it. Case in point is ’Til the Party’s All Gone, a suitably sunny reflection that revels in a freedom that is as celebratory as it is effortless (“To be passing through, no one to tell you what to do; wouldn’t that be the way to slide through your lazy days?”).

The sentiments grow more restless as faith becomes tested on All is Well.  There are devils in the wind as the title is uttered in the chorus by a blind man with profound uncertainly. “I lost my keys to the future, I lost my hold on the past,” Bramblett sings over a light, patient, piano-crisp arrangement full of autumnal jazz.

Somewhere between those extremes sits John the Baptist, a slab of earthy spiritualism undercut by the guitar and sitar of longtime Bramblett pal Davis Causey, and a blast of ultra funky baritone sax from Tom Ryan. It all makes for a sermon that sounds cunningly streetwise.

The album’s loveliest – and perhaps most curious – moment is Detox Bracelet, a slow-motion portrait of a runaway life. Images are presented like snapshots of objects and people in blurred motion. But when forced to a halt, the hurt – and, eventually, beauty – of life is revealed (“There are gifts of desperation everywhere”).

And for a record so filled with beauteous, soulful ruminations, those are just the bright spots.

If it succeeds in doing nothing else, Steve Earle’s The Low Highway solidifies the veteran songsmith’s reputation as one of today’s most steadfast surveyors of life in hard times. Sure, he chooses to chase such trials down rural highways into small towns, only to then stir the ensuing restlessness that prompts the urge to escape. But the vicious cycle that such journeys entail have long triggered some of Earle’s most captivating songs.

The Low Highway doesn’t so much conform to such a thematic scope as extend it. Perhaps the most extreme – and, curiously, most accessible – example is 21^st Century Blues, in which Earle depicts a future largely unchanged from the present. At first, his observations seem almost comical (“No man on the moon, no man on Mars. Where the hell is my flyin’ car?”). But deflation quickly sets in when the utopian visions designed by John F. Kennedy and others crumble into cold realities. For Earle, the future is permeated by the self-centered arrogance of today (“It’s head for the hills, every man for himself. Nobody helpin’ out nobody else.”).

It should come as no surprise that the album’s bleak view of the present often resembles the Dust Bowl of America’s past. In fact, The Low Highway’s title tune is ripe with the imagery of Woody Guthrie. Here, the blacktop Earle travels is like a passage through purgatory, a roadside view of a disenfranchised countryside, its inhabitants and its spirits. “The ghost of America (is) watchin’ me through the broken windows of the factory,” Earle sings with a glib drawl. “Naked bones of a better day as I rolled on down the low highway.”

Calico County is a close-up of the decimated America Earle witnesses – specifically, the rural terrain that is a breeding ground for poverty, ignorance and drug-addled ambivalence. Earle spits it all out in verses of Dylan-esque wordplay over a rolling electric groove (“Friday night dogfight suckin’ on a meth pipe”). Burnin’ It Down then brings the grief out of the shadows to confront the ignition of “10 gallons of gas and a bottle of propane” at the epicenter of the antagonist’s symbol of smalltown grief: the local Wal-Mart.

So vivid is the scenery along The Low Highway that you almost forget the efficient roots-driven support that Earle has been provided by the current lineup of his long-running, the Dukes (amended here to the Dukes and Duchesses with the inclusion of wife/keyboardist/singer/songsmith Allison Moorer and fiddler/mandolinist Eleanor Whitmore).

Their playing certainly eases the journey. But when you’re driving through fire, as Earle does for much of The Low Highway, no accommodations can take your eyes off the flames surrounding you.

ZZ Top: Frank Beard, Billy F. Gibbons and Dusty Hill.

It was a dream combination – a ZZ Top concert on Cinco de Mayo. After all, what better day (or way) to celebrate the blues and boogie music that the Texas trio has blasted forth with for more than four decades?

Guitarist Billy F. Gibbons, bassist Dusty Hill and drummer Frank Beard were on a roll Sunday night at Richmond’s EKU Center for the Arts, giving their set list a serious shakeup and having a ball with crunchy guitar workouts full of rootsy, rustic and highly economic drive. Sure, the fact it was Cinco de Mayo probably helped. It certainly gave the trio’s border-radio classic Heard It on the X a greater gravity. But it could have been Arbor Day and ZZ Top would have delivered the goods.

Musically, the 90-minute performance hasn’t strayed much from the elemental, blues fortified grinds the band has always favored. To that end, this was Gibbons’ show all the way. As the trio’s only soloist, he summoned up thick, angular solos that nicely worked off the plentiful boogie grooves at the heart of most tunes. When the music shifted strictly to the blues, as during 1975’s Blue Jean Blues (one of many surprises the band spruced up its set list with), Gibbons’ soloing was more fluid. But at no point did he overindulge. A jam band ZZ Top is not. Instrumental jaunts, and Gibbons’ rich soloing, favored brevity. Only on the still vital blues medley of Waitin’ for the Bus and Jesus Just Left Chicago did the band slow the melodic flow and take its time. Still, Gibbons’ solo was contained and immediate.

Then there were the hits, most of which have aged well – save for the static, syncopated Legs. The ’80s Eliminator singles Sharp Dressed Man and Gimme All Your Lovin’ possessed a crisp pop efficiency very much in keeping with the rest of the performance, while the ’70s boogie anthems La Grange and Tush (which closed the show) reflected a refreshing level of Lone Star wildness.

But what was featured around all that stole the show. The opening Precious and Grace (from 1973’s Tres Hombres) was unexpected. Ditto for Certified Blues (which was exactly that thanks to Gibbon’s soulful playing), an exquisite relic from 1970’s ZZ Top’s First Album and the roadhouse rumble Nasty Dogs and Funky Kings from 1975’s Fandango!

Hill piloted the last forgotten gem, the band’s 1992 cover of Viva Las Vegas, which it seldom performs anymore. It was a crowning, celebratory touch for a boogie band that manages to fashion almost any day – onstage, at least – into a holiday.

Sherrie Austin

She has championed country music tradition on two continents, secured TV stardom in Los Angeles and even landed a role on Broadway. So what is missing from the career of Sherrie Austin?

How about a crystal ball? Since her primary artistic vocation is songwriting, such a device might come in handy. Maybe then the Sydney, Australia, native would get advance word on what country celeb would be next in line to cut one of her songs.

So far, her track record has been impressive. Artists who have cut her material include George Strait (Where Have I Been All My Life), Blake Shelton (Good at Startin’ Fires) and Tim McGraw (Shotgun Rider). But forecasting how far any artist can go with her music is impossible. And if anyone thinks they can pinpoint a hit before it happens, Austin has some choice Aussie words for them.

“Anyone who says they know is, well… see, I’m Australian. I use a lot of curse words. So I’m thinking now, ‘How do I put this?’ People will want to tell you that they think they know. But they don’t know if it’s a hit. No one does.

“I write with a lot of artists, so you try to structure songs for them in a way that will get them played, that will offer them the most possible opportunities to be heard. So that’s a whole different kind of mindset than just sitting down and writing for yourself. But sometimes those end up being the commercial hits, too. So there is no real rhyme or reason to any of it.”

Austin had her own run at the charts. She chalked up a Top 20 hit in 2003 called Streets of Heaven. But the records and occasional performances she puts her name to (including the one she will give on Monday to close out for the current concert season at the Norton Center for the Arts in Danville) are more stylistically spacious.

The songs on her most recent album, 2011’s indie-produced Circus Girl, open up into areas of folk, Americana and pop while her Monday show will present Austin in a trio format with guitarists Shane Hines and Will Rambeaux.

“I love doing the acoustic trio show. I did a lot of band performances through my recording career. But this is the most fun way of performing because you get to strip the songs down and then tell the stories behind them.

“You also tend to attract people with these kinds of shows who are real songwriter fans themselves. So the whole thing centers around listening crowds. It’s different from playing a honky tonk with a full band. That is one kind of experience. But this is my preferred way of performing.”

But Austin is equally versed in more elaborate stage productions. Between the success of Streets of Heaven and release of Circus Girl, she spent 18 months in New York performing on Broadway in the Johnny Cash tribute revue Ring of Fire.

“It was wonderful,” Austin said of the experience. “I grew up doing musical theatre. And I needed just a little break from Nashville at the time to go do something new. I met some people who said, ‘Hey, would you like to come do this?’ And I said, ‘Sure.’”

Ring of Fire was far from Austin’s first connection with Cash’s music. She opened Australian concerts for the Man in Black while still in her teens.

“I was only 14 at the time. So it was an opportunity I appreciate more the older I get. It becomes cooler with time. Johnny Cash was as huge a star in Australia as he was here. Those shows introduced me and kind of catapulted me to the next step of my career. They were a healthy part of bringing me to the United States.”

So was another show that had nothing to do with music. Austin auditioned for the ‘80s sitcom The Facts of Life while still in Sydney and eventually won the role of Pippa McKenna.

“I was very young and it was a very heavy experience,” she said. “But the show brought me to the United States. My whole family moved. It was kind of the beginning of my career in TV and film and put me in the right place at the right time.

“Being an entertainer is all I’ve ever done. I never did a regular job. I just always acted and sang and wrote. Now, I’m very much concentrating on writing. That seems to be where my heart really is. It’s all kind of tied together in a way. There’s a pattern running through it, but of course you don’t see it until you look back on it. But I’ve been very fortunate to have always been able to do what I love in my life.”

Sherrie Austin Trio performs at 7:30 p.m. May 6 at the Weisiger Theatre of the Norton Center for the Arts, 600 West Walnut St. in Danville. Tickets are $30. Call (877) 448-7469 or go to Nortoncenter.com.