Bright Series: Cris Jacobs Band

Cris Jacobs lost his way for a while.

After years as an acclaimed singer-songwriter and guitarist, lauded by NPR, Rolling Stone and Paste, touring with Steve Winwood and Sturgill Simpson, and earning the respect of some of the finest musicians in American roots music, Jacobs reached a point where he wondered whether he wanted to make music anymore. He had been struggling with depression for a long time and was questioning his musical identity and trying to understand what, after years of “scratching and clawing,” he was still reaching for. He fell into a very deep depression.

So he went back to the beginning.

Back home outside Baltimore, Jacobs picked up an acoustic guitar, a pencil and a scratchpad and returned to the music that had always made him feel grounded: bluegrass, folk, blues and the sound of a string band playing together.

Then came an extraordinary vote of confidence. Dobro legend Jerry Douglas agreed to produce the album. Jacobs’ longtime friends and top flight artists, The Infamous Stringdusters signed on as the house band. Billy Strings, Sam Bush, Lindsay Lou, Lee Ann Womack and the McCrary Sisters joined them.

Surrounded by musicians of that caliber who believed in him and his songs, Jacobs wrote the 11 tracks that became One of These Days, an album that feels less like a reinvention than an artist finding his way home.

The songs are deeply connected to the place Jacobs comes from. Baltimore and Maryland's Eastern Shore run through the record, populated by characters inspired by the people and stories he grew up around. "Work Song (I Can Still Sing)," featuring Lindsay Lou, was inspired by Eastern Shore crab pickers doing grueling, monotonous work. One worker’s determination to keep singing through it stayed with Jacobs, becoming a song about the simple, sustaining power of music.

The album was recorded live because, once these musicians started playing together, the energy in the room was simply too good to capture any other way.

That same immediacy is where Cris Jacobs thrives. A masterful guitarist with a soulful, elastic voice, he can move from an intimate story song to an explosive roots-rock jam without ever losing the emotional thread. He brings the Cris Jacobs Band to Caffè Lena at a particularly meaningful point in his career: not starting over, but returning with a clearer sense of who he is and why he makes music.

There’s a line at the heart of "Work Song": no matter what, I can still sing.

Cris Jacobs can still sing. And this time around, he knows exactly why he is.

The Bright Series is made possible by a generous gift from Kevin & Claudia Bright.

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